You Say Roll
by Kurusan
Summary: Izuku Midoriya thought he didn't have a quirk. Deciding that if he couldn't be a Hero in real life he would do it at the table, he sets out on a journey as the worlds one and only Gamer.
1. Roll for Initiative

Life wasn't fair. That was the final conclusion Izuku Midoriya had come to after hours of soul searching.

Not too long ago, he would have declared proudly and without shame, that _he _was going to be a Hero. That he was going to stand tall and alongside his child hood friend and race forward in the shadow of the greatest Hero to ever live. All Might.

Now... now he was wandering the streets of his city despondantly, not sure what he was even doing with his life. It had been a few hours since All Might - freakin _All Might _\- had saved him from being... infested would probably be the word. Izuku was no fool. He knew that in that moment, his death had been almost assured. But he had been saved, by his childhood idol no less!

And yet here he was, hours later with no more tears to cry and a backpack full of broken dreams. Well no, not literally broken dreams. Breaking dreams would be a quirk. A really evil one. But still, _a quirk. _

And Izuku Midoriya, whatever else he might have in this life, did not have a quirk.

So in reality, his backpack was full of handwritten notebooks. Hundreds and hundreds of pages of research on costumes, fighting styles, and quirks. In another life Izuku was certain he could have been a scientist or a police analyst. But he didn't _want _to be any of those things. He wanted - more than anything in this world - to be a _Hero._

_'I'm sorry young man, but those without a quirk simply can't be Heros.' _

Such simple words from such a good man. And yet... they nearly _broke _him. Because they carried with them not just the weight of truth, but of _experience._

Izuku stopped walking as he worked to fight back the tears he was sure had all dried up by now. It was growing dark and the shops in the little shopping arcade he found himself in were beginning to close their doors and shut off the lights. Izuku realized forlornly that he didn't even really know where he was. He had no idea how to get home.

"Crap..!" He cursed in panic, looking around the empty streets for anyone he could ask for directions. He didn't find anyone persay, but he did notice a small store situated between a clothing shop and a rental agency that still appeared to be open. It was almost easy to miss, and Izuku likely would have if it hadn't been the only store with the lights still on.

Hurrying over to it, Izuku found the store adorned with some of the strangest imagery he had ever seen. Posters covered the entire front window of the store, obscuring vision of the interior. Images of goblins, dragons and swordsman mashed together in a collage of art styles that cut off abruptly as they touched the door frame.

Izuku hesitantly stretched his arm out and pulled the door open, causing a tinkling bell to ring out. The bell immediately silenced the sounds of excited chatter coming from inside the store as Izuku stepped inside.

"Hey, can I help you?" A chipper voice called from just ahead of Izuku. He turned his head toward the sound and away from the mass of bookshelves and painted miniatures in glass cases lining every available surface, only to find himself staring blankly at... well nothing. Or no... not 'nothing' but...

Izuku allowed his gaze to pan downward to the t-shirt with the words 'Hobby Shop' emblazoned on it. The shirt - which at a glance appeared to be held up by a pair of moderately sized breasts, hung in the air above a short skirt that likewise did so.

"Hey, eyes up hear buster!" The voice said, and a faint swishing of the air around him told Izuku that something had just been moved near him that he couldn't see.

Izuku was so gobsmacked at the talking clothes that he nearly didn't pick up the full context of the statement. When he did his head rocked backwards and he turned his eyes to the ceiling, blushing furiously and screaming internally at how stupid he was.

"OHMYGOSHIAMSOSORRY!" He said in a rush without pausing for breath.

He was met by the sound of raucous feminine laughter and then a few seconds later felt a gentle pat on his shoulder.

"Hahaha! Oh wow that was great. Come on I _know _you were just looking at my shirt. I just thought it would be fun to tease you. I'm Toru, Come on in~." The woman - Izuku _assumed _it was a woman anyway from the voice and the... outline... said with a chuckle. Then he felt something warm and soft grab his hand and the clothes started to move, dragging him along behind them.

"My name's Izuku Midoriya and - Ah wait, I just needed to ask... " Izuku blurted then trailed off trying - and failing - to pull his hand away from the girl leading him further into the tiny shop. This wasn't because he couldn't have pulled his hand free given a concerted effort. No, the truth was, Izuku Midoriya simply couldn't muster the strength to do so. He had been having an _exceptionally_ bad day. A day that, to all accounts, had sort of been the capstone to an exceptionally pitiful life. And yet here he was being led on by... he hesitated to think 'beautiful' but at the very least a _shapely_ woman. He couldn't help but seek some slight comfort in her friendly attitude and warm touch - even if, as the owner of the shop she was almost definitely significantly older than him.

Also he was still _really _embarrassed, and sort of didn't want to admit he wasn't here to buy anything.

Heedless to Izuku's self depreciating train of thought, Toru dragged him through the tightly packed racks of books lining small store, eventually pulling him into a better lit open area at the very rear of the building. There was a table there laden with half eaten bags of snacks, several cans of soda and dozens of the little figurines Izuku had seen upon first entering the store. Unlike the ones in glass cases, these seemed to be placed almost haphazardly atop the table, each on perfectly centered inside of a square on what turned out to be a map of some kind that had been criss crossed with a black grid.

"Hey guys, I found a new customer." Toru said cheerfully, dropping Izuku's hand and slipping around to the head of the table where a large cardboard screen had been erected between her and the rest of the table. Izuku barely noticed, still staring at the table intently as he tried to discern what exactly was going on.

What... _was_ going on? When he bothered to look closer he realized that the majority of the little statues on the table appeared to be little green men - goblins he guessed - with only four outliers. A man in heavy armor wielding a sword, a woman stealthily crouched behind a tree with a bow and arrows, a man in thick robes wielding a staff, and another armored man holding some kind of symbol high overhead. Was this... some kind of war game? A tactical simulator? There were pieces of paper with numbers and bits of information written on them to either side of the map so it definitely seemed like -

"Hey! You just gonna stand there muttering or are you gonna take a seat." A male voice called out to him, causing Izuku to blink in confusion and fully look up from his considerations. The table, he realized, had more than just Toru sitting at it. There were four adult men there as well, some of them nursing cans of beer or leaning back in a relaxed manner while watching him with amusement.

"Eh?! Ah, sorry! I was just looking at your... game?" Izuku tried carefully stepping forward and pulling out one of the many chairs lining the cramped space around the table and sitting in it. Despite the fact that there was an entire store around them, this tiny area almost seemed cut off from the rest of the building, a small world all it's own. There was a friendly ambience to the room as though everyone here had long grown accustomed to each other and the cramped quarters. It was... nice. It had been a long time since Izuku had genuinely sat down in such a warm and friendly environment.

"Don't worry about it. I've seen weirder." The man said, waving him off and then turning a critical eye back to the map on the table.

"Like what?" Izuku asked carefully, sliding his backpack off and placing it at his feet. He didn't really have a lot of money, and he really should have tried to go home at this point but... He _liked_ it here somehow. It almost felt like he belonged here - which was absurd because he didn't even know what was being played or anyones name except Toru. Still, he felt that if he had to he could spend some of his meager savings to purchase something and stick around. It wasn't as though he had many friends to spend it with in the first place.

"Well Gen over there insists on playing 'hot sexy elves' no matter how much we tell him to stop." The first man said, pointing across the table at another man who rolled his eyes and reached out to flick one of the miniatures on the table proudly.

"Listen man, I'll stop doing _this_ when _you_ stop hitting on every serving wench we come across." The man snorted, then reached across the table to a set of dice that Izuku hadn't previously noticed laying on the table. He assumed they were dice because of the numbered sides but... they weren't _normal_ dice. At least one of them seemed to have more sides than Izuku could easily count without holding it himself, something he wasn't likely to ask about given his relative newness to the shop.

"That's not me! It's Kreegor!" The first man said defensively.

"Alright boys calm down. Midoriya I'd like you to meet the Burning Eagle Adventuring Company! We get together every once in a while to play Dungeons & Dragons. If you're looking for something specific in the shop you can ask any of these guys and they'll be able to point to it without even looking!" Tooru cut in excitedly, and Izuku got the impression from the motion of her shirt sleeves that she was waving her arms about ecstatically.

"Oh um. Actually before that, could any of you tell me where I am? And where the nearest train station is?" Izuku said hesitantly, drawing annoyed groans from all four men at the table.

"Hagakure! Come on you can't just drag people into the store like this! Were not doing _that_ badly!" One of the men said admonishingly.

"I didn't! He walked in! You heard the bell!" She retorted petulantly causing Izuku to turn bright red in renewed embarrassment.

"Um I didn't come to buy anything but, I'm really interested in this game now! Does it have a rulebook?" Izuku said, rushing ahead with his last ditch face saving measure. He now felt doubly terrible for intruding on Toru, and really didn't want her to think poorly of him for some reason. She had just been so... friendly. He couldn't even begin to imagine what it would feel like for her to suddenly dislike him, not after the day he'd been having. He thought it spoke volumes about his self esteem that the opinion of this complete stranger could make him feel better.

"See! Bleeeeh!" Toru crowed, saying - literally _saying_ \- the sound effect for sticking one's tongue out at you. Izuku could guess pretty easily why given her invisibility but it was still an exceedingly strange experience 0to say the least.

"Pft. Come on don't mess with him. If he doesn't even know what Dungeons & Dragons is there's no way you can just drop Pathfinder in his lap and expect him to understand it." Gen stated.

"Come here Izuku, you can read the rule book while we play." Toru said, ignoring her companion. Her statement was accompanied by the sudden jerking of a chair next to her on the other side of the screen she had erected. Izuku blinked rapidly at the motion, taking a few seconds to remind himself that she was invisible and stuff like this probably happened around her a lot, then quickly moved around the table.

When he sat down he realized that Toru actually had _several_ books hidden behind the screen, many of which lay haphazardly atop each other as if they were actively being referenced. As he sat the books began to close and reorganize themselves, getting neatly stacked to one side and leaving only a single book open, which lifted into the air and shut before drifting towards Izuku.

"Ehem." The first man that had spoken to Izuku faux coughed, eyeing the space Toru occupied meaningfully and causing the book to stop half way to Izuku.

"Oh! Right Boss. This'll be 3000 Yen." Toru said brightly, wiggling the book in front of him. Izuku vaguely recognized the dragon art on the cover as being one of the images emblazoned on the store front, which was secondary to the realization that this book - of which there appeared to be _many_ more - was _expensive_. Still... he had said he would buy it so...

With robotic movements Izuku jerked his bag open, withdrawing his wallet and almost all of his spending money. He carefully held it out in Toru's direction, then when it lifted out of his hand and towards her, he reached out and took the book. He felt... something as the money changed hands and the book - entitled 'Pathfinder Core Rulebook' dropped into his grasp. He couldn't quite place his finger on what though - so he ignored the feeling as just one of many strange sensations he was likely to feel in a new and uncomfortable situation. He was, after all, in entirely uncharted territory.

Book in hand, everyone present smiled warmly at him before a predatory gleam appeared in their eyes, the entire demeanor of all those present suddenly changing in the blink of an eye.

"Alright! Who's turn was it?" Toru declared, lifting a set of dice in what Izuku assumed was one of her hands, then rattling them against each other in anticipation.

"I believe it was _my_ turn." someone said, followed by several grumbles of agreement.

"Okay. So, the Goblin Chieftain has fled the ruins with the Hangman's Noose, and you have only a short time to dispatch his minions and give chase-" Toru began, her voice growing sonorous and taking on a certain gravitas that Izuku would have expected more from a stage actor than five people sitting in a shop at night. He looked back and forth between the book in his hands and the table, before allowing the book to settle unopened in his lap. After all, he had a perfectly good front row seat to see the game played first hand right?

-ooo-

Several hours later Izuku Midoriya was enamored. He knew that it was just a game, but sometime in the middle he had completely gotten lost in the narrative of what was going on. He stopped seeing the miniatures and the dice, and instead began to treat the goings on at the table like one extended movie experience. One where the _players_ got to be the heroes. True it was all a game, but it was so... so _involved._ It was as if there was a little piece of each player present in their character. As if they were acting out their desires to the best of their ability in a world where they could do anything they wanted, unburdened by society.

And Toru! Toru was amazing! He had been confused at first that she didn't seem to have a character of her own, and when he'd brought it up tentatively she had laughed raucously at him. Because the whole _world_ was her character! Every person the party meant, every creature they fought, Toru was there narrating the results of rolls, wailing for help, crying out for revenge on the party of do-gooders that had thwarted her nefarious plots. She was ruthless and kind, lazy and excitable. Toru seemed to be able to fill any roll required of her at the drop of hit and enjoyed every second of it.

Izuku had spent the entire night watching them play, and had gotten so lost in the action that he had practically forgotten where he was. At one point he had whipped out one of his notebooks and began to draw the scenes in his head as they played out, making use of his extensive practice drawing heroes to perfectly replicate the images he wanted. He had refused to show anyone what he was doing of course - that was just too embarrassing. But he had resolved that the next time the group played together he wanted to be there to watch. Or maybe play. He wasn't really sure many of the rules _worked_ but he was confident he could grasp it them if he sat down with the rule book for a day or two. It wasn't as though he had anything else to do alone - there was no way he was going to get into UA. Not as he was. Probably not even if he had trained his whole life. After all, he had no quirk. He would _never_ be a hero.

Not in real life anyway.

"See you next week guys." Toru said weakly to Izuku and everyone else as they walking out of the store. Izuku looked blearily at the light of the morning as he exited behind her, feeling alarm bells going off in his head that he was simply too tired to entirely consider the reason behind. The Burning Eagle's had been awake all night, and the owner - who Izuku had finally found out was _not_ Toru - had made the decision to simply close the shop for the day so he could sleep in. They were all pretty tired after all.

"See you next weak Hagakure-san." Izuku said, making sure to use her last name and the proper honorific instead of the overly familiar first name he'd spent most of the night calling her. It wasn't as though he was trying to be overly friendly with her. She just hadn't bothered telling him her last name. He'd only pieced together his own mistake after realizing that literally _everyone_ at the table had called her Hagakure and not Toru.

"Geeze not you too. Don't let those old guys fool you, once I've rolled dice with someone were _friends_ Izuku. Don't forget that!" Toru yelled after Izuku as he left, drawing a wry smile from him as he waved goodbye to her and made his way to the train station. He could have walked home - it wasn't _that_ far - but it was just easier to take the train to a closer stop and navigate home from there. He was _insanely _tired.

So with a spring in his step, and a hefty hardcover book in his backpack, Izuku Midoriya had happily dragged himself home. It really should have dawned on him what came next, but again, he was _very _tired by this point. As he approached his home he noticed two police cars parked outside of it. He made note of this, thinking to ask his mother about what had happened, but it wasn't until he walked through the front door of his house to find two police officers consoling his crying mother that Izuku really understood what was going on.

Yesterday All Might would undoubtedly have reported their meeting to the police - assaulting Izuku would naturally need to be added to the list of crimes that sludge bodied villain he had captured would be tried for after all. So not only had Izuku's last known location been immediately after a villain attack, he had then gone missing and not returned home the following night. All of this flitted through Izuku's sleep deprived mind at nearly warp speeds, causing him to pale in distress. He kicked his shoes off and threw his backpack to the wayside, rushing into his living room and to his mother.

"Mom! I'm so sorry!" Izuku yelped as he rushed to her side, causing her face too shoot up from her hands where she had been crying. The two police officers with her turned annoyed gazes on him, to which he could only bow apologetically.

"Oooooh my baaaaaabbyyyyy!" His mother wailed grabbing him and pulling him into a fierce hug that knocked all the breath out of him.

"Well... if that's all then..." One of the officers said placidly, stepping towards the door. Izuku's mother didn't answer them, busy as she was crying into his shoulder, but Izuku himself turned his head towards the officer and nodded at him once more apologetically.

"I'm so sorry for the trouble." He apologized again, bowing as much as was possible with his mother hanging off of him.

"It's fine, but we'll need you to come down to the station to make a statement at your earliest convenience." The officer said firmly, and Izuku nodded already aware that something like this was likely. As much as Heroes subdued and captured Villains, it was still the job of the courts and the police to build a case against them. Japan was a civilized country after all - they couldn't just throw everyone who got beat up by a Hero in jail without a trial. And if that sludge Villain's personality was anything to go by, the police were going to have a _very_ long list of crimes to try him, her, or it for.

"Yes sir." Izuku acknowledged, then watched as the police took their leave.

"Don't ever do that agaaaain!" His mother continued to cry into him, resisting his attempts to lever her off.

"I'm really sorry Mom. Um." Izuku paused, realizing he should probably get this out of the way now instead of scaring his mother half to death once a weak every week.

"Actually I was out with some friends last night and just forgot to call home... I was thinking of going out again next week..." Izuku said with as soothing a tone of voice as he could muster.

"Absolutely not! You don't even have a quirk! How are you going to defend yourself if something bad happens!" She said fiercely, leaning away from him and giving him a menacing glare that Izuku was fairly certain every mother learned by default.

"Mom really it's fine they were... I mean I ran into these four heroes in their downtime and was just hanging out with them when I got lost. They were really cool and said I could come back again so..." Izuku trailed off, realizing belatedly that he had just sort of lied to his mother. He hadn't done it intentionally really, he was just so tired that the larger than life characters he had seen at the table that day stuck out to him. More so than even the people playing them to be honest. The human fighter, the elven archer, they were Heroes of another stripe than Izuku was accustomed too, but they _were _heroes.

Izuku's mother continued to glare at him for a few more moments before deflating like a struck balloon. She fell bonelessly onto the couch as the accumulated stress of the previous day finally left her and the nervous energy that had kept her up through the night faded away.

"Are you sure they're safe? Are they _good_ heroes?" Inko Midoriya asked finally after a second, knowing full well her sons obsession with the topic. She trusted his opinion on the various heroes of the city. She doubted that there was anyone else in the world who had done even a fraction of the research that Izuku had. If her son said that the Heroes he had met were good enough to protect her baby then she would trust him. Especially when she considered the fact that this might very well be as close to actual heroism as her poor quirkless boy would ever get. The depressing thought ran through her like cold water, further souring her already poor mood as she watched him patiently for an answer.

"The best." Izuku answered immediately, thoughts of damsels in distress and villages under siege filling his mind.

"...Fine. But I want you to call me to let me know your safe!" she said strongly.

"I will Mom." Izuku quickly agreed, tension leaving his body. He really didn't mean to worry his mother like that. If it had even occurred to him to try he would definitely have called her to let her know he was safe but otherwise occupied. Now that the situation was resolved though his sleepiness had once more returned, and he trudged quietly away from the living room where Inko had flicked the TV on to watch intently. He returned to the homes entryway and scooped up his back pack, before walking silently back to his room - where he summarily fell asleep.

-ooo-

The next week went past in a blur. Izuku spent nearly the entire weekend holed up in his room combin through the core rulebook, and the more he read the more he fell in love with it all. In Pathfinder, everyone started out small. Started out _even_. There was no reliance on inherited super abilities. There was no reason one person should be inherently better than anyone else. And the only way to get stronger was to work hard. To stare down overwhelming odds and triumph.

It appealed to Izuku in a way he found hard to put in to words. The more he read the more he felt as though he was part of something. And the more he read the more he _wanted _to read. By the time school had started back up on monday Izuku was practically bursting with the need to know more. He about certain rules. He had more money than he was ever likely to spend on himself, and he knew for a fact where he could get both the answers to his questions _and _more books.

Naturally Izuku didn't dedicate _all _of his time to his now fledgling passion. The school year was nearly up and he no longer maintained the insane belief that somehow he could get into UA's Hero program.

The acknowledgment of that fact had come to Izuku only _after _he had started preparing for it. That monday he had been spending his lunch period studying. Reference books on mechanics and wiring he had bought on the way to school seemingly on a whim laid about his hiding place on the roof of the school. Here, he was the least likely to be found and harassed by Bakugou, his long time tormentor and one time friend. He had been just about half way through a scribbled note on how to apply his new knowledge to the creation of armor when he truly _understood _what he was doing.

He was preparing to take the UA entramce exams... for the _support _class. The class that made useful tools for the _actual _Heroes.

His pencil had fallen to the ground just like that and suddenly he found himself unable to concentrate. This was it. The exact moment when he had one hundred percent accepted and given up on his dreams. He felt... hollow. Empty even. Like there was no point in anything and there never would be ever again.

Unbidden he pulled a different book from his bag, and began to flick through the freshly worn pages of the Core Rulebook. It didn't really make him feel better but it was... calming. Like the book in his hand was the last bastion of his delusional dreams. The last tiny ember of hope he could allow himself in this world.

After a few more moments of reading Izuku managed to calm down. He wiped his tears with a sleeve and put away the book. There would be time for that later. Right now, he had to study.

Tuesday found Izuku outside the Hobby Shop after school, staring pensively at the door. Now that he was a few days removed from the bizarre experience that had brought him here the first time, he wasn't sure if he was actually all that welcome here. He wasn't just new to the game or the shop, he was basically entirely new to normal socialization. He was _that _maligned at school. He basiy had _no _friends to speak of, and owing largely to his obsessive personality, he hadn't been very interested in making some just for the sake of having them.

This was different. This was a group of people who had - for the first time in a _long _time - accepted him as one of their own. He hadn't realized it at the time but not one of them had bothered to ask him about his quirk. It was the societal equivalent of 'what's up' at this point. After all, almost everyone had a quirk, and it was fun to compare them.

Just not for Izuku.

"Okay. I can do this!" Izuku said, slapping his cheeks and psyching himself up. He quickly yanked the door to the shop open and navigated inside, chest puffed up with false confidence.

"Gen-san, I've got some questions about-" Izuku said as he marched towards the small counter and register in a corner of the shop. He was forced to grind to a halt when he actually bothered to _look _at who was at the counter.

Instead of the friendly if someone scraggly man Izuku had veen expecting, Toru Hagakure was there. She was standing on a small step ladder behind the counter and stretching out on her tiptoes while replacing a light bulb.

"Oh. Good evening Hagakure-san." Izuku said, swiftly changing gears even as almost all of the blood in his body rushed to his cheeks. It wasn't just that the invisible girl was present - Izuku wasn't so painfully naive as to completely implode just because he was speaking to a girl. No, the issue came from what she was _wearing_.

Unlike the previous time he'd seen her, today Toru was wearing a long sleeve sweater and a pair of thick tights beneath her shorts. It wasn't inherently sexual by any stretch of the imagination, but it did serve to do one thing that had jumped out at Izuku the second he'd seen her.

It made it possible to _see _her legs and thighs. Actually, since it was almost the only part of her he _could _see it actually became almost the entire focus of Izuku's attention. It didn't help that - primarily because she was on a ladder - her rear end was practically eye level for Izuku.

"Huh? Oh! Hey Izuku, what's up?" Toru said cheerily as she finished screwing in the lightbulb.

"I h-h-had some questions about the rules!" Izuku managed to say, his head swinging back and forth as he tried to find anywhere else to look but at Toru.

"Welllll..." Toru said, humming in thought before she jumped nimbly over the counter to stand before it, then leaned back to sit on it, crossing one leg over the other in a clearly superior pose.

"The first rule is no touching I think." She said decisively, pulling suggestively at the neck of her sweater in a way that would reveal her cleavage if she weren't invisible. She held the pose for a ten count, watching with barely restrained mirth as Izuku's teenage mind reasoned out what she was implying.

She continued to watch with barely restrained laughter as his face turned a brighter shade of red than it had already been. Then his eyes looked up to the space he probably assumed her face was - a surprisingly accurate guess she noted - and his face went completely pale.

"I-I-I wuh- guh- eh?" Izuku gurgled, only slightly intelligably.

This was apparently too much for Toru because she uncrossed her legged and burst out laughing, slamming one hand in sheer amusement on the counter as she did so.

"Hahahaha! Oh man! You're the best Izuku. No one reacts like you do!" She cried out, cackling for a few seconss more before her laughter finally died down.

Izuku stared at her in absolute confusion for a few seconds before he realized that she was just messing with him. Again. By the time Toru had finished her laughing fit Izuku had ready turned to the nearest unadorned wall and began banging his head against in repeatedly. Not hard enough to hurt but more than enough to chastise himself for his shamelessness.

Seeing this, Toru hopped up and moved to lat the boy on the back in a soothing manner.

"Don't worry about it Izuku. Wanna know a secret?" She said, faux whispering conspiratorially to him. He turned his head towards her slowly, eyes watery with unshed tears and an expression that Toru would have thought was extremely cute if she didn't realize how genuinely bad the boy felt.

Taking his attention as acknowledgement Toru continued saying;

"You know how sometimes you pass someone on the street or in class, and you try to look at them without them knowing, so you sorta wait till they aren't looking?"

Izuku nodded, his expression growing more pensive as his quirk obsessed mind started reasoning out where this was going.

"Well you know, it's kind of impossible to tell when _I'm _looking." Toru said with a knowing chuckle. Izuku stared blankly at her for a few more seconds before paling even more.

"So when I came in..." he said.

"Mhmmmmm?" She encouraged playfully.

"You could tell where I was..." Izuku continued pitifully.

"Yuuuuup." Toru said with a chortle. She watched Izuku shift back and forth between deathly pale and cherry red for a bit before she patted him companionably on the head.

"Heh. Anyway. You had some questions?" She said, walking back around the counter to take a seat.

An hour later - most of which consisted of Izuku spluttering through a dozen apologies - Izuku was happily situated at the back of the Hobby Shop with several new purchases and a much greater understanding of the game than he had when he first arrived. Pathfinder it turned out, was not a part of the main line of Dungeons & Dragons products. As Toru quite enthusiastically explained to him, Pathfinder was actually created in response to an intensely negative opinion from the games fans of it's fourth edition - which apparently drastically changed many of the rules and even the way in which the game was played.

Much of this information went over Izuku's head - after all, he had never seen any other version of the game but this, and he was largely uninterested in exploring his options. He couldn't quite put his finger on _why_ but he simply felt an inexplicable _connection_ to these books. Simply holding one left him with the electrifying feeling of _adventure_. That day Izuku did almost all of the preliminary reading in order to create his first ever D&D character - which according to Toru was excessive since most people just made a character and learned the rules as they went. He had asked why it was still called D&D when the game they were playing was not, in fact, actually called Dungeons & Dragons, and for just the briefest of moments he could almost swear his invisible host was _scowling_ at him. Then the moment had passed and she had simply told him not to question her on this particular topic. Izuku wasn't quite sure exactly how much of what Toru told him was her opinion as opposed to established fact_, _given her demands that should he be asked what the best edition was he reply with 'second edition' - despite having never played it himself.

Regardless, Izuku returned home that evening feeling more balanced than he had in a long while. He had never realized the constant stress he was under when he was chasing his... former... dream. Bitter as it was for him to admit it, Izuku was forced to consider that maybe forsaking all social and recreational activity for years in order to chase a dream he could never have might have been bad for his mental health.

Izuku sometimes cursed the fact that he had such a highly organized mind. It took until that Wednesday to realize that he could technically go to the Hobby Shop to study. In his head, 'study' meant 'library'. The idea of visiting what was nominally a game store to study had completely escaped his notice until one faithful day with Toru.

"Hey Izuku, how come your backpack is always full of textbooks?" She had asked during his trip to the shop that day.

"Huh? Because I just came from school." Izuku said in confusion.

"But it's like five pm, school ended hours ago." Toru pointed out.

"I study at school for a few hours before I come here." Izuku admitted easily, more focused on searching out and avoiding any prank Toru may have arranged ahead of time. He hadn't know her long but Izuku had rapidly come to realize that the invisible girl absolutely loved freaking people out. She had an easy going and friendly demeanor that made it easy to get comfortable around, and apparently knew extremely well how to make use of that tendency to make the most of any joke that required shock value.

"Why not just study here?" She asked in confusion.

"Because... huh." Izuku started then felt a twitch develop in his eye as he really thought through what he was going to say. He was _going_ to say that he wasn't allowed to study there. But the fact that Toru was asking him why he didn't do so somewhat negated that.

"I hope you're more perceptive than that this Friday or you're going to get killed by the first trap you come across." Toru teased before heading back to her place at the counter. As much as Izuku would have liked her to keep him company, he was more than aware that he was technically intruding on her while she was working. It was only the fact that he had been coming in spending almost all his savings to buy things here recently that assuaged his guilt over dragging her away from her job.

With Toru's departure Izuku once more returned to his secondary studies of the Pathfinder RPG books. His problem, he thought, was that he had no idea what type of character he wanted to play. There were almost _too many_ options in these books. Izuku could literally do anything he wanted - he just _wanted_ to do everything. Eventually he narrowed his options for classes down to two. He decided on either a Bard or a Magus. Bother classes were a sort of hybrid between physical combat and mystical acumen. Both classes would allow Izuku to play the parties 'switch hitter', moving between the front and back lines at need to fill holes. Both would allow Izuku to play with magic - something he was adamant he use.

Still, he had to now choose between the two classes, which was no easy task. Setting the thought aside for the moment, he decided to ask Toru her opinion when next he got the chance to speak with her. The evenings were when the store was at its most busy, and it was likely that Izuku would leave before he got the chance to ask his invisible friend for any more detailed information. There was a sort of relaxed ambience to the store that more than just Izuku seemed to appreciate. Despite keeping to himself several regular customers breezed into the store throughout the evening, giving casual greetings to Toru and settling in to play a variety of card or board games before leaving. Izuku honestly couldn't understand how the store even made any money when it was just letting anyone who cared to come inside use the sitting area. A fairly large number of visitors didn't even purchase anything.

Not that Izuku was going to _say_ anything about it.

Now for race... Izuku was no stranger the the concept of fantasy races. Intellectually he knew what a dwarf or an elf were - but he just could see himself as one. This made his choice of race for his character a no brainer. He pulled out his - almost entirely blank - character sheet, and filled in 'Human' in the spot that denoted race.

Then, deciding he had more or less gotten everything he could out of his day, he went home.

Thursday was notable for only a single reason. It was the day of his final exams. Izuku breezed through them of course - even before giving up on his dreams, Izuku was _very_ aware of the fact that he was going to have to get by using his brain to achieve what most Heroes did with their quirks. So it was no surprise that - while not the _top_ of his class - he was fairly high up in the rankings. He went to school that day as relaxed as could be, barely noticing the resentful glowers from his classmates at his nonchalance. He was far too engrossed in his own thoughts.

Which class? He had to finish his character sheet today. He didn't want to waste anybodies time by forcing them to wait for him to fill his sheet in on Friday night, but he didn't think he could complete the whole thing properly without help from Toru.

As a Magus he would wield arcane power to empower his attacks and destroy his enemies, but as a Bard he would have a much greater range of utility options. A Bard could heal, replace a Rogue as the local trap expert (in a pinch at least), and buff the entire party with it's singing. By contrast, it's damage potential was much lower than that of the Magus. Which one did the party did? Which one did he _want_?

His thoughts were cut off abruptly, when he bumped in to someone on the way the Hobby Shop. Classes had naturally let out early once the exams had finished being written, and so the shopping arcade was full of happy and depressed students in equal measure. So it wasn't a surprise that Izuku - who had once again fallen into a trance like state of contemplation while murmuring his rapid fire thought processes had turned the corner into the arcade and nearly bowled over a girl his age.

"Kya!" she yelled cutely when she fell, snapping Izuku out of his thoughts. Without really thinking about it, Izuku snapped to attention, lurching forward to grab the girl by the hand and pull her upright. The girl reflexively grabbed his hand as he reached out, resulting in them holding hands, and they spent a pregnant second staring at each other, their hands intertwined after she had regained her balance.

The girl, who's messy ash blonde hair was styled into two buns that seemed to only barely be holding together, with loose and wild strands of hair sticking out of them at odd angles. Her eyes were angular, their irises a bright yellow that left Izuku thinking of the luminescent glow of a cats eyes in the dark. She was wearing a sweater one size two large that hid her over all figure, and had sleeves that all but covered her hands in their entirety, but between the creamy white hand holding his own, and the girls pale face, Izuku got the impression that she must not get out often. That or she was mixed.

When several more seconds passed and the girls gaze flicked down to where he was still holding her hand, Izuku's mind finally caught back up with the situation at hand, and he jerked his hand backwards quickly. However instead of letting go and allowing him to move his hand away the girl held strong, which resulted in her jerking forward to press into him. Instead of be surprised the girl seemed almost to _expect_ the sudden reversal, and her face split into dopey too wide grin as she tilted her head up to look at him.

"Wh-wh-wh-" Izuku stuttered, unable to discern what exact was going on but realizing that he was _deeply _uncomfortable with it. His mind started running a mile a minute trying to resolve the situation, until it finally landed on the only possible solution he could think of. A highschool girl who dyes her hair, goes out mostly at night, is weirdly okay with touching strangers.

Compensated Dating!

"SORRYBUTI'MNOTINTERESTEDANDALSODON'THAVEANYMONEYSOIGOTTAGOBYE" Izuku blurted out on a single shallow breath, leaping bodily away from the girl who was still smiling blissfully at him, showing a pair of catlike canines that seemed to gleam in the mid afternoon sun. He then walked as fast as he could around her, directly into the Hobby Shop. He didn't see the girl turn to watch him go. Or the way her eyes - which had rings around them from a lack of sleep - crinkled happily as she gazed after him. She stared patiently at the shop he had gone into for a while longer, her pale hand dipping into her school bag to gently caress something within. Then spun on her heel and walked away, a happy look on her face and a new spring in her step.

Inside, Izuku was taking deep, calming breaths. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that he had just gone through the most harrowing experience of his life. Well, no, if he included earlier in the week when he had nearly _died_ then he supposed it would be the second most harrowing. Still. He would be perfectly happy if things would go back to normal and stay that way for the next several years at least. He wasn't sure his heart could take all this... this... _change. _He was already stretching the limits of his social acumen making friends with Toru after all.

"What's up Izuku?" Toru called from the counter upon seeing him enter in a panic.

"N-nothing. Um. Hagakure-san, could I ask you to help me out today if you have some time?" He asked instead of answering the question directly.

"I dunnoooo. I'd help a _friend_ out but all my _friends_ call me Toru~" She said with a teasing tone in her voice.

"T-Toru-san I-" Izuku said.

"_Toru_." She interrupted, enjoying the specific shade of red Izuku turned when presented with this most recent ultimatum. She'd be lying if she said she hadn't taken a shining to the boy. It wasn't often she encountered other people her age that were interested in the same things she was. The vast majority of the shops customers were adult men, and even her own Dungeons & Dragons group was made up of veteran players and old timers. As much as she acted boldly in the shop, there was just _no way _she was going to openly advertise her hobby's at school. She already had a hard enough time being the girl who's only visible characteristic was her bust.

"T-T-T-Toru!" Izuku finally managed to bark, stuttering and shaking like a scared chihuahua the entire time.

"Alright! For you Izuku, I would _love_ to help! Whatcha need?" Toru asked, hopping slightly and taking a pose that was only visible because of the long sleeve shirt she happened to be wearing that day. She supposed the victory sign she was throwing up could be mistaken for a lot of things given her lack of gloves, but she figured Izuku understood her well enough by now to get the point.

"Should I be a Bard or a Magus?" Izuku stated swiftly, his facial expression shifting quickly to the focused look he always got when he was paying attention to something he thought was important.

"Eh. Bard I guess?" Toru said lightly, amused by how seriously her green haired friend was taking this.

"But why? Isn't a Magus better?" Izuku asked.

It should be said that Izuku - who had until this point, never actually _played_ Pathfinder, had missed some of the nuance of what made the game a _role playing _game. He had, until this point, entirely discounted the invisible power that came with things like diplomacy or deception. Things that the Bard excelled at, and the Magus did not.

None of this had to be said though, because it was a very common mistake for new players to make. Toru knew that. She also knew that Izuku wasn't the type of person to refuse to adapt, ruining the game for everyone else because of his strict adherence to a war game mind set. Still, what he had just said _bothered the shit out of her_.

"Oh? And** why is that?**" She asked with a tinge of menace in her voice as she stepped swiftly forward to place her hands roughly on his shoulders. Izuku was actually about the same size as her - which was surprising because she was actually fairly short - and so this maneuver, which wouldn't be all that intimidating to anyone else, was _extremely_ effective on Izuku.

"D-damage! They do more damage!" Izuku blurted in a rushed attempt to make the sudden feeling of danger he was sensing in the air go away.

"I see, I see. So if you were a Magus trying to get away from me right now, you'd punch me?" Toru mused aloud, tightening her grip on Izuku's shoulders and slowly drawing him closer to her.

"What!? No! You can't just attack everyone you...oh." Izuku yelped, quickly realizing the point she was trying to make and relaxing.

"There it is! Plus you know, Bards are kind of infamous in this game." Toru said, releasing her grip on Izuku and dusting off his shoulders, the air of menace surrounding her vanishing as if it had never been there. She didn't, Izuku noted, step out of his personal space yet.

"How so?" Izuku asked, tentatively taking a step away from her and not being overly surprised when she stepped forward to keep up with him.

"Well Bards you see, are well known for one thing above all else." She said, stretching an arm out and pulling Izuku into a conspiratorial huddle with her arm firmly draped over him.

"W-what's that?" Izuku queried, eyeing her hand on his should suspiciously.

"There isn't any problem a Bard can't solve... by _seducing it._" Toru said, whispering the last part into his ear. Izuku's explosive leap away from her and subsequent sprint into the sitting area at the rear of the store was harried by the cackling laughter of an invisible woman that lasted _far_ to long.

About an hour later, and finally settled on a class, Izuku now had to decide on only a few more things before he could finish his character sheet. He would never admit it, but the idea of using his wits and charisma (what little of it he had anyway) to resolve his problems appealed to Izuku. In a way, he had been preparing his whole life to do just that. He would certainly never admit that seduction of any kind factored into his decision making process. Especially knowing that any character he seduced would technically just be Toru. Nope. No connection at all.

He decided from the start that he wanted to be agile, and good with his magic, which as a Bard meant to prioritizing his Charisma stat. In Pathfinder, every character had six such statistics. Strength - or how strong you were, Dexterity which was how agile you were, and Constitution which was how durable you were made up the physical statistics. Intelligence which was how smart you were, Wisdom which was apparently how much common sense you had available to you, and finally Charisma which denoted your general attractiveness and force of personality. As it turned out Bards (somehow) cast their spells via force of personality. So, after a few moments of tinkering Izuku settled on the following statistics;

**Strength: **10(+0) **Dexterity:** 14(+2) **Constitution:** 14(+2)

**Intelligence:** 10(+0) **Wisdom:** 10(+0)** Charisma:** 18(+4)

Izuku frowned down at his character sheet. It was rapidly wearing down at the edges from constantly being transported back and forth between home, school, and the shop. He wasn't entirely happy with the statistics he had chosen, but couldn't decide on exactly how to change them. He knew he needed Charisma to cast spells, and Dexterity to aim those spells - as well as dodge attacks. He also knew he would need some constitution - there was no way he was going to be able to avoid taking damage, so he thought it was for the best that he have some extra health to mitigate that.

Still... he wished he could have put a few more points into his Strength score. He knew he didn't necessarily need it - after all he could still _use_ a sword if he had to - but something about a low strength score simply sat wrong with him. When Izuku thought of the word 'Hero' only one man came to mind; All Might. And when Izuku tried to think of what All Might's stats would be, well, Strength was about the only thing he could think of.

"Wait. I'm not making All Might. I'm not even making _me_. I'm making..." Izuku glanced down at the blank space where the name of his character would eventually go. Then carefully penciled something in.

"Deku. There." He said firmly. True, it was a weird name - an insulting one given to him but his long time bully in fact - but he had long since decided to simply own it. It wasn't as though Bakugou had always meant it maliciously after all. The fact that he was creating a fictional character brought something else to mind. Namely, the characters history.

"Okay! 'Deku' is a super studious librarian who loves reading stories about 'Heroes'. He's studied lots of old legends, and wants to be a Hero himself one day!" Izuku said, pleased with himself - right up until it occurred to him that he had more or less just described himself.

If he were a fantasy character.

"Is that really so bad though...?" He wondered aloud, biting his lip in thought. After a few more seconds of consideration he decided that no, no it wasn't. After all, everybody else seemed to have a little bit of themselves in their characters. So why shouldn't he? Thinking more on the topic, Izuku quickly shuffled through the growing stack of books he had purchased, flipping through pages until he found what he was looking for. Since he knew that his character was once a librarian, he decided to make them a Bard with the 'Studious Librarian' archetype. Furthermore, he allocated his skill points to prioritize conversation, magic, and most importantly _crafting_. It made sense to Izuku that a completely defenseless librarian would use every tool available to keep himself safe while adventuring - and when one has access to books, that list of tools was vast indeed.

His character sheet finally beginning to look as though it would be done soon, Izuku excitedly allowed his gaze to fall to the 'Feats' section of the page. A Feat, in Pathfinder, was an ability that was more specialized than a general skill, but that wasn't quite powerful enough to come as part of a class. There were tons to choose from, and they helped differentiate your character from another that might have the same class. However your character only received a feat occasionally, and not every level - so it was important to decide what you wanted before hand.

"Dodge and... Mobility I guess?" Izuku thought, haphazardly ignoring his own screaming instincts telling him he should read every single feat in the game before making such a decision. As a Human, his Bard would receive and extra feat, and frankly, he really didn't think he had _time_ to indulge his obsessive personality in this case. So after penciling in his feats and the abilities his class provided for him, Izuku sat back to admire his densely filled in character sheet.

**Deku**

**Health:** 10

**Human Bard (Studious Librarian) Level 1**

**Strength: **10(+0) **Dexterity:** 14(+2) **Constitution:** 14(+2)

**Intelligence: 10(+0) Wisdom: 10(+0) Charisma: 18(+4)**

**Skills:**

Bluff +8 , Bluff (fool someone) +9 , Craft (Alchemy) +6 , Diplomacy +9 , Escape Artist +6 , Intimidate +8 , Knowledge (Untrained) +3 , Perception +4 , Perform (Oratory) +8 , Sense Motive +4 , Spellcraft +6 , Use Magic Device +8

**Special Abilities:**

Armored Casting, Bardic Knowledge, Bardic Performance, Countersong, Inspire Courage

**Feats:**

Dodge, Mobility, Scribe Scroll  
**Known Bard Spells**:

**1st (2/day)**—cure light wounds, disguise self  
**0 (at will)**—ghost sound(DC 14), light, mage hand, prestidigitation(DC 14)

Izuku couldn't help but smile at the sheet. He had chosen his spells partially at random - he understood that they were basically all useful one way or the other, and so he had merely taken the ones that interested him. The only thing he hadn't filled in yet was his equipment - which Toru had told him he could ignore for the moment. The fact that she said that with an evil snicker didn't fill Izuku with confidence, but since she was nominally in charge of the game in the first place, he happily acquiesced.

"Yes!" Izuku cheered, pumping one arm in the air in triumph. There was just something so very, very, satisfying about completing his first character sheet. Looking up from his papers however, Izuku realized that it was getting late, and that he should probably head home.

"Haga- Toru-s - Toru! I'm heading out!" Izuku called out, quickly stumbling through names until he finally landed on the one Toru preferred he use when talking to her. He stood from his table and glanced around himself with slightly tired eyes. He had barely even noticed the passing of time as he worked, referencing different books each time he had to make a decision. He was somewhat surprised to find that there were actually a number of people amiably chatting nearby, mostly because he hadn't even noticed them on his way in.

"Did you see the weird girl just standing outside?" One of the nearby men asked, drawing and then playing a card on the table in front of him then sifting about in his hand for another card which he put down on top of it.

"What the blonde girl? I swear, the street walkers get younger every year." The other man grumbled, eyeing the new card on the table before sighing dejectedly and motioning for his companion to continue.

Izuku froze at that, because he had a pretty good idea of who it was loitering about the shopping arcade. It wasn't as though he had anything against the girl he'd met earlier. Just, the idea of being anywhere near such an 'experienced' woman causing Izuku's teenage mind to go into almost total melt down. He simply wasn't able to process that type of thing very well - least of all from a complete stranger.

"Maybe I can ask Toru if I can go out the back?" Izuku mumbled to himself as he finished pushing all of his bags into his backpack. He frowned as he did so, noting that his poor bag was starting to stretch precipitously as a result of all the extra baggage he'd taken to carrying around. He might have to consider getting a new one.

Or... he could just carry less stuff. _A lot_ less stuff. As in, not carry his entire library around with him everywhere he went.

...God he really _was_ a nerd like Bakugou said.

"Sure." A voice answered his muttered question, causing Izuku to nearly jump out of his skin when he realized that Toru was standing next to him - and probably had been for some time if the way she was leaning against the wall with a can of soda was any indication.

"Gah! Why!?" Izuku practically begged, placing a hand over his heart and waiting for it's excited beating to finally calm down. Toru shrugged, then gestured with her can in Izuku's direction.

"If you didn't react like that I wouldn't do it." She said bluntly then gestured towards the other nearby patrons of the shop.

"Those guys barely even notice me anymore." She continued. Izuku squinted at the floating set of clothes that constituted Toru on any given day.

"So... you just mess with everybody until they get used to it?" He asked forlornly, knowing he wasn't likely to be getting used to the invisible girls antics any time soon.

"Nah, I usually stop after a while. Your pretty cute when your freaking out though, so I wouldn't bet on it." She chirped happily, and was gratified by Izuku's face turning a familiar shade of red.

"A-a-anyway. I'm gonna go now. B-bye." He stammered, turning to walk robotically towards the door at the back of the shop with a huge 'Employee Only' sign on it.

"Byeeee Izukuuuu." Toru said pleasantly as he escaped out the door and into the cool air outside. The sun had set, and and the arcade was lit primarily by a few overhead lights hung at intervals until one made it to the street. The rear of the area was significantly less welcoming than the interior though, as Izuku was immediately assaulted by the unpleasant smell of garbage from the local businesses, many of which kept their garbage bins or dumpsters in this area.

Wrinkling his nose at the scent, Izuku quickly turned towards the street and began walking. He was just about to clear the last dumpster, when a delicate hand whipped out from behind it, grabbing him by the collar and dragging him forward.

"I~ Got~ You~" A sing song voice crooned as it dragged Izuku into the dark recess behind the dumpster. Izuku felt a momentary pang of dread run through him as his eyes adjusted to the light and he saw the blonde from that afternoon standing before him, smiling sweetly. He was momentarily surprised by how strong she seemed to be. She was shorter than him, but somehow seemed to have an iron grip on him, which she used to whirl around and slam Izuku into the brick wall of the building. Realizing that panicked stuttering wouldn't actually help him hear, since this girl had clearly gotten the wrong message the first time he had done it, Izuku firmed his resolve.

"U-Um, I'm really sorry but I'm not... not..." Izuku said, trailing off as he fully took in the extent of the situation he was in. He was - not unreasonably - under the impression that he was going to have to decline this girls attentions on the basis that she was looked for well... money. This was something that he realized might _not_ be the case, when he saw the polished kitchen knife she held loosely in one hand.

"Heehee, I know we just met and all but I think I really like you!" The girl said with a happy, almost manic tone that bordered on delirious. Izuku kept his eyes on the knife in her free hand, unsure of how exactly to respond to that.

"I... but then... knife?" Izuku asked on complete confusion. What this girl was saying and what she was _doing_ were completely at odds with each other.

"Well you see, it's just that I really love tattered guys reeking of blood you know? You seem like you'd look _suuuuuper good_ like that." She said, her eyes turning lidded and her breathing heavy. Izuku was both dumbfounded and terrified. It hadn't even been a week since his last near death experience and now _this_. He had to find a way to get her away from him. Or call for help. Or both. Probably both.

What should he do though? He was defenseless. He was _quirkless_. He had wanted to be a Hero but he couldn't even deal with a teenager with a knife. That was just pathetic.

_'You can't just attack everyone'_

The thought came to him like a bolt out of the blue. Yeah he was quirkless. Yeah he was weak. But you didn't _have_ to fight your way out of every situation. As a point of fact, unless you were a Hero you _couldn't_ fight your way out of most of them. He didn't need to look at this like a fight. He needed to look at it like a _Bard_. So what would a Bard do?

_'There isn't any problem a Bard can't solve... by seducing it.'_

Okay. He could do this. He could definitely... probably... do this. His life _literally_ depended on it. With what he would later look back on and describe as a shocking lack of self preservation, Izuku's hand shot out, grabbing the blade of the knife the girl held in his hand. He forced himself to look up from the bladed weapon and deep into her yellow cat like eyes.

"I-If..." He started, then firmed his resolve and plastered a fearless smile on his face that he absolutely did not feel at the moment.

"If you want we could go on a date sometime?" He offered, knowing he was going to call the police the absolute second he was free of this psychopath. The girls eyes widened and then narrowed at him as though trying to peer through him.

"I dunnoooo. I've been burned before you know? I think I'd rather -" She said, the manic expression that had temporarily begun to fade when Izuku spoke returning in full force. Izuku felt the knife in his begin to move, and knew he had to do something. So he took the single piece of information he had on this girl and rolled with it.

He gripped the knife tightly, noting the blond girls eye roll when she thought he was trying to pushed the knife away, then yanked hard on it, allowing his hand to glide over the blade. The result was instantaneous, as this hand tore open and began bleeding profusely. His aggressor was so surprised by the seeming nonchalance he did it with that she forgot that she was planning to stab him - which was, of course, the point. Still inwardly Izuku was...

_'Oh my god this hurts so much. Is this going to need stitches? Oh god I'm going to need stitches. And tetanus shots. No, a whole checkup! Who knows where that things been !?'_

With deliberate slowness, Izuku raised his now bleeding hand, and pressed it against the nut jobs cheek. It was grotesque. It hurt. And it took literally every iota of his will power not to grimace, scowl, or cry. Possibly all of the above. The girl locked eyes with him for a moment and time felt as though it froze as Izuku watched her process this new situation.

In his head, Izuku could feel something knock itself loose, as though a long forgotten part of himself had suddenly sparked to life and begun to motion. The clattering of dice could be heard, and when they finally stopped Izuku felt more than he heard;

**Bluff Check! 22! Success!**

Wait... what?

And then the crazy girl relaxed, her smile somehow growing less feral and more... appreciative. She turned her head, leaning into Izuku's bleeding hand. When half of her face was covered in the warm liquid, her tongue darted out to flick across his palm, sending a shiver of revulsion down Izuku's spine.

"Mm, fine. I'll see you tomorrow mystery guy." She hummed, spinning away from him with her arms outstretched as though she were a princess in a Disney movie. When she was a few meters away from him, she leaned over, picking her school bag up and depositing her knife in it with a single, smooth practiced motion. Izuku had to wonder exactly how often she had done this to get that practiced at it... then he felt another shiver run up his spine and he decided to put the thought out of mind for the moment.

The girl continued to stand and stare at Izuku, her gaze becoming progressively more crazy looking and her face becoming redder and redder, until finally she covered it with her hands, the droopy sleeves of he too long sweater creating a natural veil.

"Kyaaaaa!~" She yelled in exhilaration, before turning and sprinting away at a speed Izuku would have generally considered impossible without a quirk of some kind. Mentally he added 'some kind of speed quirk' to the list of information he had gathered on his would-be paramour before several things caught up to him all at once.

For one, his hand hurt _alot_. For another he was pretty sure the stress of the moment had caused him to go temporarily insane. He had definitely heard dice just now. And a voice telling him he had succeeded. And of course, there was the fact that he had _nearly just died_.

Izuku began to shake, slowly at first, and then more and more violently, until he was practically a nervous wreck leaning against the wall of the building. He started to hyper ventilate, and could see the edges of his vision turning dark as his body failed to draw in the necessary oxygen to maintain consciousness. He needed to calm down. Needed to distract himself so he didn't black out right here in the street for some other sicko to find.

Still shaking, he slid to the ground in the shadows, pulling off his backpack. Slowly, so that he didn't fumble and drop it, he withdrew his character sheet from his backpack. He patiently read each and every word on it. Burning it into his memory, forcing himself to think about literally anything else by knives and crazy women. And then something strange happened. His character sheet, no, 'Deku's' character sheet, began to burn up, as though it had be tossed into the fire. The entire thing simply went up in a puff of smoke and ash that was blown away in the gentle night breeze.

Izuku stared with steadily increasing panic at the blatantly bizarre occurrence, before suddenly a hovering white _screen_ appeared in front of him. It was a perfect copy of his character sheet, except for two things. At the very top and very bottom of the screen. The first difference, was the name. No longer was his bard named Deku. No, now emblazoned atop the strange hovering screen, was the word 'Izuku Midoriya' in thick, black lettering. The other difference was at the very bottom, where a new ability had been added. It read;

**Quirk: The Gamer**

You, are a D&D Character.

-ooo-

**Yoooo. I wrote this whole thing as a relaxation aid. Work has been shitty and is likely to continue to be shitty for a while, and I wanted to do something that wasn't an ongoing work. It ended up being way god damn longer than I had originally intended for a throwaway pilot chapter of something, but I'm pretty happy with it. If your reading this, and your actually familiar with D&D - throw me a bone, I was trying to sort of dumb it down for anyone reading who doesn't have any idea what the hell any of this stuff means. I actually did write a literal character sheet for Izuku here, and was inspired to write this almost entirely by the ending theme where all the BnH characters are in a fantasy setting. I realize that in all likelihood Izuku is probably a Fighter in that world but that would be boring as fuck to write. I dunno. Tell me what you think folks. I suppose this fic would technically fall under the LitRPG category of writing, which is something I don't have a lot of experience writing. I'm kind of trying to feel out how many hard mechanics and numbers to include in the writing as opposed to glazing things over. I'd like non players to be able to understand whats going on but I don't really want to bloat my word count by turning every chapter into a tutorial for the game. And yes, the title is a reference to You Say Run. Shush. I'm simple.  
**

**Oh and as always,**

**Thanks for reading.**


	2. Izuku Midoriya, Level One

**The following is Izuku's full character sheet / stat block. You do not have to read this to enjoy the story. You may skip this chapter at your leisure. **

Male human bard (studious librarian) 1  
LG Medium humanoid (human)  
Inititiative +2; Senses Perception +4

**DEFENSE**  
**AC** 13, **touch** 13, **flat-footed** 10 (+2 Dex, +1 dodge)  
**hp** 10 (1d8+2)  
**Fort** +2, **Ref** +4, **Will** +2, +2 trait bonus on saving throws against fear effects

**OFFENSE**  
Speed 30 ft.  
Space 5 ft. by 5 ft.; Reach 5 ft.  
**Special Attacks** fascinate

**Known Bard Spells (CL 1st, concentration +5):**

1st (2/day)—cure light wounds, disguise self  
0 (at will)—ghost sound(DC 14), light, mage hand, prestidigitation(DC 14)

**STATISTICS**  
**Str** 10,** Dex** 14,** Con** 14, **Int** 14, **Wis** 10, **Cha** 18  
**Base Atk** +0;** CMB** +0; **CMD** 13  
**Feats** Dodge, Mobility, Scribe Scroll  
**Skills** Bluff +8 , Bluff (Fool someone) +9 , Bluff (fool someone) +9 , Craft (Alchemy) +6 , Diplomacy +9 , Escape Artist +6 , Intimidate +8 , Knowledge (Untrained) +3 , Perception +4 , Perform (Oratory) +8 , Sense Motive +4 , Spellcraft +6 , Use Magic Device +8  
Traits courageous, trustworthy  
**Languages** Common, Dwarven, Elven  
**SQ** armored casting, bardic knowledge, bardic performance, bonus feat, cantrips, countersong, inspire courage, skilled

**SPECIAL ABILITIES**  
**Armored Casting (Ex)** You can cast bard spells while wearing light armor and use a shield without incurring the normal arcane spell failure chance.

**Bardic Knowledge (Ex)** You add +1 to all Knowledge checks and may make all Knowledge skill checks untrained.  
Bardic Performance You are trained to use the Perform skill to create magical effects on those around you, including yourself if desired. You are trained to use the Perform skill to create magical effects on those around you, including yourself if desired. You can use this ability for 8 rounds per day. Each round, you can produce any one of the types of bardic performance that you have mastered. Starting a bardic performance is a standard action, but it can be maintained each round as a free action. Changing a bardic performance from one effect to another requires the bard to stop the previous performance and start a new one as a standard action. A bardic performance cannot be disrupted, but it ends immediately if you are killed, paralyzed, stunned, knocked unconscious, or otherwise prevented from taking a free action to maintain it each round. You cannot have more than one bardic performance in effect at one time.

**Bonus Feat** Humans select one extra feat at 1st level.

**Cantrips** You have learned a number of cantrips, or 0-level spells. These spells are cast like any other spells, but they do not consume any slots and may be used again

.  
**Countersong (Su)** You can counter magic effects that depend on sound (but not spells that have verbal components). Each round of the countersong you make a Perform (keyboard, percussion, wind, string, or sing) skill check. Any creature within 30 feet (including yourself) that is affected by a sonic or language-dependent magical attack may use your Perform check result in place of its saving throw if, after the saving throw is rolled, the Perform check result proves to be higher. If a creature within range of the countersong is already under the effect of a noninstantaneous sonic or language-dependent magical attack, it gains another saving throw against the effect each round it hears the countersong, but it must use your Perform skill check result for the save. Countersong does not work on effects that don't allow saves. Countersong relies on audible components.

**Courageous** Your childhood was brutal, yet you persevered primarily through force of will and the hope that no matter how hard things might get, as long as you kept a level head you'd make it through. You gain a +2 trait bonus on saving throws against fear effects.

**Fascinate (Su)** You can use your performance to cause up to 1 creatures to become fascinated with you. Each creature to be fascinated must be within 90 feet, able to see and hear you, and capable of paying attention to you. You must also be able to see the creatures affected. The distraction of a nearby combat or other dangers prevents this ability from working. Each creature within range receives a Will save (DC 14) to negate the effect. If a creature's saving throw succeeds, you cannot attempt to fascinate that creature again for 24 hours. If its saving throw fails, the creature sits quietly and observes your performance for as long as you continue to maintain it. While fascinated, a target takes a -4 penalty on all skill checks made as reactions, such as Perception checks. Any potential threat to the target allows the target to make a new saving throw against the effect. Any obvious threat, such as someone drawing a weapon, casting a spell, or aiming a weapon at the target, automatically breaks the effect. Fascinate is an enchantment (compulsion), mind-affecting ability. Fascinate relies on audible and visual components in order to function.

**Inspire Courage (Su)** You can use your performance to inspire courage in your allies (including yourself), bolstering them against fear and improving their combat abilities. To be affected, an ally must be able to perceive your performance. An affected ally receives a +1 morale bonus on saving throws against charm and fear effects and a +1 competence bonus on attack and weapon damage rolls. Inspire courage is a mind-affecting ability. Inspire courage can use audible or visual components. The bard must choose which component to use when starting his performance.  
Language Humans begin play speaking Common. Humans with high Intelligence scores can choose any languages they want (except secret languages, such as Druidic).

**Skilled** Humans gain an additional skill rank at first level and one additional rank whenever they gain a level.

**Trustworthy** People find it easy to put their faith in you. You gain a +1 trait bonus on Bluff checks made to fool someone. You also gain a +1 trait bonus on Diplomacy checks, and Diplomacy is always a class skill for you.


	3. I Want To Cast A Spell

What was he supposed to do with this!?

Izuku stared at his hand with a horrified expression. He felt the telltale strain around his eyes that signified he was about to cry, and he did his utmost not to wail in accompaniment with those tears.

He was a _Dungeons & Dragons _character!? What did that even mean!? He just wanted to indulge in the one thing that made him happy anymore! Was that so much to ask? He didn't _ask _for this. He was perfectly resigned to his place in life as a nobody. He had accepted it, internalized it, and done his utmost to suppress the existential dread that came with literally watching your dreams die right in front of you.

So he - the completely average, boring beyond all measure boy he was - was having an extremely hard time coping with the sudden influx of _extremely weird _and frankly _terrifying _stuff that was happening to him.

He understood in an abstract and unspoken sort of way, that he was having a panic attack. His heart was beating so hard and loud in his chest that he could hear it as though it was directly next to his ear. He was taking huge gasping breathes that felt inadequate to the task of filling his lungs. And finally, he was sitting on the ground, behind a shopping arcade, next to a dumpster - bleeding out from a wound on his hand and shaking.

Okay he was... he was going to be okay. He was going to calm down. He was going to push this down, get up and -

He had barely avoided death!

He had _**barely**_ avoided _**death**__! _

**Condition: Shaken!**

Declared another hovering window that flickered into and out of Izuku's view so fast that - in his panic - he simply ignored it.

What was he supposed to do with that? How was he supposed to take it? He had avoided death by following Toru's advice, and just lying through his teeth - because that was his only option at the time. But now that he wasn't focused on being murdered he was suddenly very aware of how _stupid _that had been.

Okay. It was out of his system now. He should bandage his hand and -

He wasn't even good at lying! He wasn't suave, attractive, or particularly good at reading people. His idol was a man who functionally had _one _facial expression and his childhood friend was so brutally straightforward that he had to assume a rabid dog would have more tact. His only other friend was Toru - and she was _invisible! _

How had he even held his composure together long enough to _attempt _to trick that girl? He was freaking out so badly after the fact that if she had just stayed for an extra minute to watch him she would _definitely _have called his bluff.

And that thought brought the two disparate halves of Izuku's thought process - one advocating calm measured response, and the other demanding he run around in little circles and then scream until he blacked out - to an abrupt and painful halt.

What if she _was _watching him. There was no guarantee she wasn't. She'd had enough of a fixation on him to wait outside the shop for him all afternoon after their first encounter, so there was no telling what she would do next. Crazy was unpredictable that way.

**Will save! 13 + 2 = 15! Success!**

Izuku fell very, very still. The two halves of his wayward thoughts coalesced into the single driving purpose of getting home where it was _safe. _To that end, he turned towards the white screen that had told him he was a Dungeons & Dragons character that he had - until that moment - been ignoring.

Only to find that it wasn't there.

Izuku whipped his head back and forth, a new panic creeping into his mind. Maybe he really _had _been hallucinating. Maybe he was, truly and genuinely, losing his mind. He didn't _feel _crazy, but then, that girl who nearly killed him probably didn't either.

His eyes began to spin as this new train of thought took a hold of him, and his mind followed it to what was, in his opinion, it's natural conclusion.

_'Oh god. I'm hallucinating. It's not bad now but what if it gets worse? What if I stop recognizing people? What if I wake up one day and think my home is dangerous, so I run away to live my life on the streets. I'd survive on rats, slowly spiraling into greater and greater madness until a human target got to tempting. I'd be a monster! Just a another statistic on the-' _He thought rapidly, envisioning every moment of this hypothetical future with alarming clarity. Right up until he thought the word 'Statistic'.

That's when the white screen came back.

He stared once more at the bundle of text in the box. The tightly crammed lines of his very own character sheet looked back out at him as though taunting him with all the possibilities they held. Hesitantly, Izuku lifted one hand to poke at the screen, fully expecting his hand to pass through it harmlessly.

Instead his his outstretched finger founder solid purchase, pressing firmly against the portion of his character sheet denoted as 'spells'. The second his hand made contact Izuku jerked it backwards, surprised by the unexpected physicality of the thing. As he did so he noticed his motion had caused the sheet to scroll downward, as though it were a cellphone screen.

"So it's like a computer almost...?" He said curiously, before snapping out of his daze. Home. He had to go home and call the police _immediately. _The possibility that he might have a quirk or - more likely - a mental illness, did nothing to distract him from his present circumstances. So, with an enforced calm he didn't really feel he pulled his handkerchief from his bag and tightly wrapped it around his hand to stunt the bleeding. Then he picked his bag up and began to hurriedly walk home.

Paranoid as he was, Izuku tried to make certain that he wasn't being followed. He went out of his way to travel main thoroughfares that still contained evening shoppers, and ducked occasionally into convenience stores in order to see if anyone was behind him. On the second such detour, while he was nervously buying a stick of gum so he wouldn't seem suspicious, he heard it again.

The rattling of dice.

**Stealth! 9 + 2 = 11!**

Okay, he had _definitely _heard it that time. The voice that seemed to dictate the results of his actions. He knew that in a normal D&D game that voice would belong to the Game Master, but he also knew that if there was a Game Master dictating events surrounding him in the same vein as an actual game, then it would have to be a God.

And Izuku sincerely doubted such a being would take an interest in him. So more likely his quirk (and wow was it hard to even think the words 'his quirk') simply held a degree of sentience or, at the very least, the ability to emulate it. Lots of Heroes had similar aspects to their powers. Many bestial or animal powered Heroes claimed to have a voice in their heads advocating certain actions. Many Heroes who could 'summon' things claimed that the beings they formed with their quirks held a similar independence.

That tidbit squared away, Izuku turned his attention to something else that had been bothering him.

Every time he had 'rolled' prior to this, the notification had included an indicator that he had succeeded. Success! At the end of each roll. This time his Stealth roll had simply returned him a (admittedly low) number a d left it at that.

Was that because he had failed? Would it _say _he had failed? Would he just not know? Or did the results of his roll have to be readily apparent for his quirk to tell him if he had succeeded or failed? Had his prior successes been shown because he could _see _that he had succeeded?

If that was the case, then these notifications became significantly less useful to him. In a round a bout sort of way he was hoping that his Stealth roll had been a confirmation that he _was _in fact being followed, but now he wasn't quite sure.

Frowning, Izuku mindlessly stuck a stick of gum in his mouth, and poked his head out of the store to look for blonde haired pursuers.

**Perception! 13 + 4 = 18! **

Ah. There it was again. No success or failure, just an indicator that he had tried to be on guard, and if the number indicated was anything to go by, done decently at it. Now having not seen hide nor hair of the girl he was fleeing from, Izuku returned home much more quickly, rushing through crowds of people with only a minimal amount of apology. Usually this would have caused the timid boy no end of embarrassment, but he had to admit that fear of looming death was, if nothing else, an excellent motivator for self improvement.

-ooo-

When Izuku got home his mother was happily puttering about the kitchen of their small home. She had little reason to, given her husbands consistent absence, but she made an effort to cook a 'family' dinner to eat with her son nearly every night. While other children his age had already reached the point where their fledgling self image could not abide such 'uncool' socialization with their parents, Izuku had never particularly seemed to care. As a result, Inko, his mother, could be said almost to be his best friend in some respects.

"I'm home..." a voice called weakly from the entryway.

All of this was nothing more than a happy blip in the back of her mind until she actually turned around to _look _at her son.

He was pale as a ghost and shaking like a leaf. His face was gaunt with worry and his hand, tightly clenched against his chest, was covered with a damp red cloth. But most important of all to Inko, were his eyes. They were wide, lost, and confused as the he had first been told he had no quirk. It was an appearance that he had never shown her ever again after that day, but that she would never in a million years forget. For a boy so innocent and good as her son, no amount of time was enough to distance her from the intense feeling of despair that had washed over them both. She had felt, even until this day, that she had failed him somehow back then. That she could somehow have done _something _to make it better for her boy.

She was perfectly aware that she couldn't have of course. But her instincts as a mother had still set her on edge for days afterwards, looking for someone, _anyone _to blame.

And that was why - instead of dropping her ladle and wailing in terror when she saw the state of her son, she calmly pulled him into a warm, comforting hug. It was the type of accepting embrace she wished she could have given him then, and that she had sought every opportunity to give him until now. It was filled with all the love and compassion she held for her only son, and conveyed to him, not in as many words as a certain blonde hero, 'I am here'.

And when he had stopped shaking, and finally relaxed into her embrace, both of them ignoring the pot that had long since boiled over, she pulled back, looked him in the eye and demanded - in no uncertain terms;

"_What happened?_"

-ooo-

That night Izuku dreamt of numbers.

It had already been decided that when he awoke that morning, instead of going to school to determine his test scores from the previous day, the Midoriya's would be going to the police station. While many people in the country would be slightly embarrassed by this - due to the previous false alarm that Inko had called when she had thought Izuku was missing - Izuku's mother held no such compunction. She - just like (in her opinion) any _good_ parent would - had thrown things like shame and remorse to the side the very second she had heard of the type of life threatening situation her son was in.

The conversation that resulted afterwards had been extensive and resulted in the two eventually just order pizza for dinner when most of the ingredients in the kitchen ended up destroyed by negligence. Izuku had spoken with his mother at great length about his current mental state. His dreams, his aspirations, and ultimately the final realization that he couldn't obtain any of them as things currently stood. Izuku had to admit that he had been worried about telling his mother about any of that. After all, if circumstances surrounding his realization had been just slightly different Izuku could have ended up in a very... _dark_ place. Or dead. He wasn't ashamed to admit that.

But things had mostly worked out and, by talking to his mother about it Izuku had finally solidified his goals, and his destination. He had only halfheartedly bothered with it prior to this, but a new drive to create support items took hold in him. Izuku Midoriya decided right then and there that he was going to save the next generation after his own from the melancholy he had borne his whole life. He was going to make support items so _good_ that even a quirkless nobody could be a hero with them.

And all of that was fine and good but in all of that he had failed to bring one thing up with his Mother. Mostly because he wasn't really sure how even _he_ felt about it. After all, didn't he _have_ a quirk now? Did that mean he could still reach for his dreams or... would it just hurt all the more because of how late he had come into his power? Those were the kinds of doubts that filled him as he laid down to rest that evening, expecting to wake up the next day to the usual sound of traffic outside his bedroom window.

Only instead...

**Congratulations! You have survived Challenge Rating 2 encounter with 'Extremely Creepy Girl' and been awarded 300 Experience! There is 700 more experience required to reach your next level!**

The words hung in the air in front of Izuku, completely still in the endless void he found himself in. Izuku _assumed_ he was asleep, or about to be asleep. He had thought it was strange how quickly he had been able to go to sleep given the terror he had suffered today but, if instead of dreaming his quirk just brought him here then... Did his quirk allow him to sleep on command? It made sense he supposed. Nothing in the Core Rulebook had suggested that rules for something as mundane as 'not being able to fall asleep' existed in Dungeons & Dragons, but it was still a very specific and odd aspect of this new power of his. Not particularly useful for combat but the question became, did he have any way to wake himself up?

Izuku, for the first time since arriving in this empty space, tried to move around and found it almost impossible. He had nothing to stand on so he naturally couldn't get any leverage. He tried shaking his arms and legs in an attempt to use centrifugal force to move himself - and he was pretty sure it worked a little - but the second Izuku had managed to flail his way into a sort of unpleasant spin, the words in front of him simply moved to follow. It seemed that no matter where he attempt to look, those words were going to hover in front of him. Finally growing fed up with the situation, he thrust his arm outward, attempting to wave away the intrusive text, and to his surprise found the hovering words vanishing like smoke before him.

Only to be replaced by... more words...

**You have currently engaged in a long rest! You will awaken in eight hours! **

**Warning! You have not secured your camp, and as such receive a penalty to your Perception check in order to wake up early and defend yourself against surprise attacks!**

**Time Remaining in Rest: 7h 43m 18s**

Izuku stared once more at the words that had appeared in front of him. On the one hand, it confirmed that he was capable of putting himself to sleep automatically, which was good. On the other hand... was he _stuck_ asleep? If his mother came in to wake him would he simply remain asleep until she attacked him, or would he wake up like a normal person would when shaken? He could test it easily enough tommorow but the idea that he could essentially put himself in a limited time coma was... scary.

Also what the heck did 'You have no secured your camp' mean? It was his house, not a bedroll on the side of the road. It wasn't like wolves were going to suddenly appear in his bedroom to attack him. That would make no sense!

Unless... unless that was _also_ an aspect of his quirk. So far, the only aspects of the world that worked the way they did in the Dungeons and Dragons rules were things directly related to Izuku. Or, more simply put, interacting with Izuku caused the world to behave like a D&D game. But only _interacting_ with him. Izuku simply existing next to something shouldn't cause it to gain levels and classes. That would be nonsensical.

But if it _did_ work that way. If his quirk _did_ warp all of existence so that it worked like a D&D game then... wasn't there a word for this type of thing? Random Encounters he thought it was called. He couldn't be sure because the rules for that type of thing were in sections of the book intended for the Game Master and not for Players but... Izuku was quickly realizing that if he was going to survive his own quirk he might just have to ignore such niceties.

So, with growing terror, Izuku turned his attention back towards the timer slowly ticking down in front of him. He could feel his eye twitching as he worried over the distinct possibility of goblins teleporting into his room at night to bludgeon him to death. Each second that ticked down caused him to grow more and more twitchy, until finally he could stomach no more and yelled;

"Gah! Can't this thing go any faster!?"

And then, as though responding directly to his demands, the timer began to flicker downward as though in fast forward. An hour, then two, then three - in the blink of an eye the timer ran down to zero, and Izuku found himself back in his bed, with the sun shining in through his window. He was wide awake - completely lacking any of his usual morning grogginess - and he felt _strangely_ refreshed. He hadn't felt this good in... actually he had _never_ felt this good.

**You have performed a long rest and healed 1 hit point!**

Aaaaaand then the words came back. Izuku noted that for things that were of only momentary importance there was no floating text box, merely a voice in his head and an instinctual understanding of what that voice meant. He supposed it could be pretty detrimental to be in the middle of a fight only the have your vision obscured by your own quirk but it was still strangely intuitive. He wondered if he could change-

**Your settings have changed! Messages will now appear visually!**

"No! Wait! Change it back!" Izuku yelped in sudden fear. He had _literally_ just been thinking about how terrible that would be! He wanted it to go back to the way it was! He wanted it to-

**Your settings have changed! Messages will no longer appear visually!**

This was... is this damn thing making fun of him?! Annoyed, Izuku frowned then mentally will his character sheet to appear before him, paying special attention to one particular field; Health.

**Health: 9 / 10**

Seeing this new score, Izuku did some quick mental math and cringed. A dagger in D&D - the closest thing Izuku could think of to what he had been damaged with - dealt 1d4 damage, plus the strength modifier of it's wielder. If Izuku assumed that the strange woman who had assaulted him hadn't been able to apply her strength in that situation because Izuku had more or less damaged _himself_, then remembered the one hit point he had just gotten back from resting then... he had taken two points of damage. Out of ten. Put simply, if Izuku hadn't tricked that woman, then she likely could have killed him in only a few more errant strikes. He was sure there were rules for what happened when you hit 0 hit points, but Izuku wasn't exactly keen on _testing_ them.

Did he take damage normally? Or was he really and truly a Dungeons & Dragons character? In D&D the only time the details of an attack became relevant was when you landed a critical hit or were using a special ability. Normal attacks didn't really get a huge amount of detail put into them because of the sheer volume of them that could occur in any given battle. To that end, Izuku wondered if being stabbed in the face would deal the same amount of damage to him as having his hand sliced open. Would that just count as a critical hit? Or would he be able to walk around with a gaping wound in his skull because his 'health' hadn't reached zero yet? He desperately wanted to know but he also desperately didn't want to test it!

"Izuku? Are you up?" His mother called from behind the door, knocking lightly to draw his attention. Instantly Izuku remembered the circumstances surrounding his new quirk and its awakening. He shoved the majority of his worries on the topic to the back of his mind and smiled wanly at the door before answering.

"I- I'll be up in a second!" He called to her, stuttering slightly as he fully tore his mind away from what had been bothering him. He quickly rose from his bed, dressed, and shuffled out into his living room where his mother was already dressed and waiting for him. Sighing deeply Izuku was deeply conflicted about that. On the one hand, it wasn't as though they had a car - his mother wouldn't be able to get him to the police station any faster than he himself could walk there. On the other hand he appreciated what she was doing for him. He knew that his mother had always felt at least partially guilty for his status as someone without a quirk - that was why she had supported his dreams of being a Hero even when she knew it was impossible. In a very real sense, Izuku's mother was probably the only person who had _ever_ believed in him. Just her presence was enough to instill in him at least a tiny amount of courage. Still...

"You don't really have to come with me Mom." He said with a strained voice, not even really knowing himself whether he actually wanted to leave her behind or not. Instead of directly answering his statement however Inko just blinked at her son as though he was an idiot before finally choosing to speak.

"Sweety, you said that woman before had a knife right? And that she might be following you around?" His mother said pointedly.

"Yeah but-" Izuku said, feeling like now might be an okay time to tell his mother that he finally had a quirk so she needn't worry... right up until he realized that said quirk didn't have all that many fighting applications as far as he could tell. The health thing was a potential point of interest but since he wasn't planning on gambling his life away on something he didn't really understand it sort of failed to hold up to scrutiny as an argument.

"It was a kitchen knife right? Like this?" His mother continued, holding her hand out and waiting the three seconds it took the butchers knife in their small kitchen to hover into her palm. Izuku understood the point she was trying to make - she had a quirk that could (theoretically) disarm someone, and Izuku did not. But he was also very aware of the exact strength that his mothers quirk could exert and so knew better than most how purely theoretical that capability was. Izuku had grown strong enough to prevent her from taking his toys away from him by the time he was five - so he highly doubted his mother could _actually_ disarm someone, unless she had been doing some very, _very _intense training while he wasn't looking.

Seeing Izuku's obvious skepticism Inko sighed and slipped out of her shoes to go replace the knife in the kitchen before returning with a worried look on her face that quickly firmed into a sharp glare that brooked no argument.

"Izuku dear I just... you know it doesn't feel very good you know? To just sit at home and be worried about you. I know it's not much but if something happens I want to _be_ _there_. Is that... okay?" She finished, deflating as she finished speaking. Izuku couldn't help but smile at the heartfelt statement.

"Yeah. Lets go Mom." He said plainly. He wouldn't cry. He _definitely _wouldn't cry!

"Here you go sweety." His mother said kindly as they walked out the front door of the home, withdrawing a napkin from her purse and handing it over to him. It was this act of wiping the tears from his eyes that caused Izuku Midoriya to miss an action his mother performed that would eventually come to shake the Hero world. Because the second they set foot outside the home, while he was wiping away his tears, his mother paused, blinked, and swiped curiously at a space about a foot in front of her. Then, assuming she had just been seeing things, promptly put it out of her mind.

**Izuku Midoriya has invited you to join his Party! Y/N?**

It wasn't until much later - when other people met them together - that many would point out to him that if anyone was the source of his borderline suicidal courage, then it was almost _certainly_ Inko Midoriya.

-ooo-

The visit to the police station - while productive - had _not_ gone well.

In the first place, the minute Izuku had arrived there had been a mild fuss as to why he wasn't in school, until his mother had timidly stepped forward to explain that he had come to make a statement and that he had her permission not to go that day. _Then_, because he had forgotten that he still had to make a statement about the villain All Might had saved him from, Izuku had ended up shuffled off to sit at a detectives desk to wait with his mother until that Detective arrived to help them.

When Izuku had asked how long that would take, many of the other officers had merely shrugged. When he had asked if one of _them_ could take his statement, he had kindly had it explained to him that any case involved All Might had to be handled by a designated liaison, and as a result, they couldn't really help him. His mother, who was simply not the type of person to become overly enraged by much of anything that wasn't explicitly life threatening, had at that point put her hand on one of his shoulders, and pulled a book out of her purse, shaking her head at him.

When the officer they were waiting for finally arrived - apparently All Might kept him fairly busy just by being in the city - he had tiredly plopped down into the chair across from Izuku with a huge mug of coffee and listened quietly as Izuku explained the details of his near death at the hands of the slime villain, nearly two weeks prior. The detective had nodded along and made noises to indicate he was listening at appropriate moments but -

**Sense Motive! 13!**

He got the distinct impression the Detective didn't strictly _care_ what he was saying. Not because he was apathetic to Izuku's plight or to the continuation of justice in the city - but because All Might had handled it, so it was handled. It was - in Izuku's opinion - a childish and lazy way of doing your job, but since he couldn't be certain he was correct in his assumptions, he had kept most of them to himself and merely begun to abbreviate the story wherever he could. Since the officer hadn't exactly been picking apart his statement in the first place, this _greatly_ increased the speed he was able to get that bit of tedium out of the way. He briefly wondered when he had gotten so good at reading people, then remembered his assumed class and how it functioned, then filed the information away for examination at a later date.

When finally, _finally_, all the business they had to take care of with the All Might incident had been cleared up, Izuku hesitantly stopped the officer from rising from his seat and got to the _real_ reason he had come that day.

"A-actually, I'm here to report an uh... attempted murder?" He said hesitantly to the half standing officer who looked down at him in confusion.

"Didn't we just go over everything that -" He started and was immediately cut off when Inko inserted herself into the conversation.

"Not that one." She said sharply, carefully folding over a corner of the page she was on and snapping the book she was holding shut.

"Go on dear." she urged, bumping Izuku's shoulder with her own. The officer, who had briefly considered ignoring the boy in front of him, shook off such thoughts, and returned to his seat, trying to keep an open mind. He also took mental note of Izuku. If he included the false alarm that Inko Midoriya had called in over the boys disappearance (because cops have their own special kind of locker room talk for gossip), then he had been involved in at least three situations in a very short period of time. He didn't necessarily fault the boy for that, but as the saying goes, three times was enemy action.

And so Izuku spent the better part of fifteen minutes shakily retelling his very brief encounter with 'the weird girl with the knife'. The officer, who had listened to the whole story with a slight frown on his face, nodded along while paying much more attention than he had previously. Obviously he took his job seriously when it wasn't being done for him, which was a mark in his favor as far as Izuku was concerned. Unfortunately for him however...

"I am... truly sorry you had to go through that. I'll pass a description of her out to the patrol cars but you're sure you can't think of any better way to identify her? You said she had a school uniform on, did you recognize that?" The officer asked Izuku, clearly hoping for more.

"I.. uh... no?" Izuku said hesitantly. It wasn't as though this hadn't _occurred_ to him before. He _knew_ that what little information he had on his attacker wasn't really enough to ID her but he was kind of hoping that they could do something, _anything_ to help him out with his current predicament. He was sure that one of his classmates would have recognized the girls uniform - their were several of them that visited other schools after hours to meet girls in the first place after all - but Izuku didn't have a single actual friend he could draw upon to provide him with that information. Thinking about it, there was _no way_ the police would be able to catch her using only 'a blonde girl my age' as a point of reference.

"I see... look I'll have a patrol car outside your house for a few days just in case but with All Might in the city all the local scum rushing to leave. We're low on manpower as it is otherwise you see..." He said said, trailing off as he seemed to be considering something.

"I'll look into this a bit on my own time but don't expect too much okay? I'm not a Hero after all." The officer said a touch bitterly.

"That's-

**You have received a quest! Find more information on the 'Extremely Creepy Girl' !**

...Fine..." Izuku said, jerking slightly mid sentence and then trailing off as he quickly shook off uncomfortable feeling deep in his heart. He understood that it was in the nature of a D&D character to get involved in places they really shouldn't, but that didn't mean _he_ had to roam the land looking for trouble. Or so he told himself but... he really _did_ need to deal with this or he was going to get murdered before - or from his attackers point of view _on_ \- his first date with a girl.

"Good. Make sure you have a cellphone so you can call for help if anything happens okay?" The officer said sternly, rising to shake both of their hands as they left.

Izuku left the police station with a heavy heart, but tried to maintain a positive outlook on things. At the very least, tonight was his first D&D game, and since the Creepy Girl should be in school right now he would be able to sneak to the shop and settle in to wait until the evening when Toru would arrive. Then all he had to do was make sure he didn't wander into an alley alone and he should be more or less safe. It wasn't _ideal_ but he was hardly going to shut down his entire life because of nearly dying (again).

So Izuku had walked home with his mother, explained his reasoning, and then proceeded to... well not 'argue' because that word was just slightly too aggressive to describe Izuku most of the time - but at the very least, debate the point with her. It took some doing, and annoyingly, a diplomacy roll, but he _was_ finally able to convince her.

He wondered if his diplomacy skill functioned as a kind of mind control quirk, or if it was just a measure of his actual skill. He couldn't exactly turn his quirk off, so knowing which of the two it was would be helpful if only to make sure he wasn't accidentally mind controlling everyone he spoke to.

Those were the kinds of thoughts he had when he arrived at the hobby shop. He walked in confidently, waved to Gen - the owner - and then waltzed into the back to read over his character sheet one more time.

And then he remembered that the whole thing had burned up when he'd received his quirk.

With a twitch of his eye and a furious determination not to screw the one nice thing he had going on right now up, Izuku got a blank sheet from Gen at the counter, bought something to drink from the mini fridge behind the counter, and then furiously began to transcribe his own 'stats' back onto the empty page.

-ooo-

Toru Hagakure was - all things being equal, and this being a world where permanent invisibility was fairly boring as far as quirks went - a normal girl. She hated homework, kept up with her friends in their group chat, and just generally did her best to be a social person. If asked _why_ she did so, then she would be hard pressed to put it into words but... perhaps as a natural consequence of her quirk, she just naturally fit into any social environment she was placed in. Much like her quirk, if you looked to closely at Toru, all a regular person would see would be the circumstances surrounding her, and not the girl herself. Truthfully, Toru had always felt the need to cover her bases that way. She hadn't _always_ been invisible. Quirks were not usually fully expressed at birth after all, and as such, she had experienced a period of time during her childhood where she had _literally_ spent each and every day fading away. Looking back on it, it was perhaps just a bit melodramatic of her, but back then she had felt like every day was a battle to be remembered, or noticed.

Until she met _him _anyway.

_"Why are you crying little one?"_ He had asked, his face veiled in the shadow of the bridge she had been hiding under.

_"B-because I'm disappearing! I'm going to be all alone!"_ She had wailed, flailing her sickly pale looking arms the man in an attempt to make someone, _anyone_ understand her plight. Back then, every adult she spoke to had listened to her worries and returned nothing but soft platitudes and generic encouragements to her. For most children experiencing the quirk based equivalent of puberty that would have been fine, but for Toru the stock answers and explanations that were in no way personalized for her were just another sign that when she was gone there really _wouldn't _be anyone who would remember her. Just like an extra on a movie set she would fade into the background of life and become completely irrelevant to anyone and everyone - and that thought _terrified_ her.

_"Is that what you truly believe? Child, when you are no longer shackled to your own appearance, __**that **__is when you can truly begin your grand performance."_ The man had said with an almost blissful tone.

_"Wuh? But if I'm gone then no one will see me!" _She had argued back, her tears giving way to anger and this - yet another adult who only _thought_ they understood her.

_"Ah but they can still __**hear**_ _you. And through your words you can be anyone and everyone. You can be the most important person in the world child, for no one will be able to gainsay you." _He had asserted, sliding down into a seated position opposite her on the river bank.

_"How does that even work?" _She had asked, her easily fluctuating emotions giving way to childlike curiosity.

_"Let me show you."_ The man - who's face she still couldn't see, as though the shadows followed it around - had stated. And then he had withdrawn from his shirt an improbably large book that should not, under any circumstances, have been able to fit where he had taken it from. It was quickly followed by some dice, and a few more slips of paper densely filled with numbers and words. He had laid them all out on the grass between them.

And that was the first time she had _ever_ played Dungeons & Dragons. The way of the Dungeon Master had henceforth become her creedo, and the only time her true self came out was when she was around other people who played the game. A character for every scenario, a personality for every interaction. That was Toru Hagakure's way of life, and it had served her extremely well. She had friends, and a social standing, and stood out in her own way to her fellows. And even though most of them didn't know much about her likes, dislikes, or hobbies - nearly none of them actually _noticed_ that.

All of that to say, Toru was feeling extremely good that Friday afternoon after school. She quickly marched home - begging off of karaoke with her friends - changed out of her uniform, packed all of her materials for the game, and all but _sprinted_ to the hobby shop. She hadn't felt _this_ good since she had managed to worm her way into a job at the shop. For the first time _ever_ she was able to be around someone her own age, who not only knew her hobbies but actively _participated _in them. Or at least, he seemed like he was trying to anyway. What's more, Izuku seemed to be completely vulnerable to her trademark brand of teasing and pranking. Most people either got bored or angry over it after just a few light jabs, but Izuku reacted, or rather, over reacted, every single time. It was like watching one of her favourite hidden camera shows but in real time! It was just _too _funny!

_'Am I a sadist?' _She thought idly as she strode into the Hobby Shop that evening, waving to Old Gen at the counter and then traipsing into the employee only area to drop off her bag.

_'I mean, it's not like I enjoy hurting people, just surprising them. Is there a word for that? A... surprisist? Sounds stupid though...' _She mused, before shrugging off the though and sneaking into the seating area at the back of the store. Sure enough, Izuku was already there, scribbling madly at his character sheet, and occasionally flicking his hand through the air like he was trying to shoo away a fly.

With practiced ease she lowered herself into a crouch and began the unpleasant task of making her way behind the boy, using the surrounding chairs and tables as cover. So few people appreciated the work she had to put in to 'magically' appear behind them. It wasn't as though she could teleport, and her _clothes _certainly weren't invisible. Really, the only way Toru was going to be completely invisible would be if she was also completely _naked_. And while she was willing to go pretty far out of her way to mess with people, _that _was a line she hoped never to cross.

A full minute passed as she crept closer and closer to her target until finally -

"GEH!?" Izuku yelped as she lunged the remaining few feet to silent stop behind him, immediately transitioning to tickling the short boys sides. She held back a victorious cheer as she smirked at him, appreciating the amount of air time she had managed get out of him when he leapt from his chair in surprise.

"Evenin' Zuku!" She cheered standing to her full height and placing an elbow on Izuku's head where he was seated.

"Are you _ready?_" She asked, flapping the color of her shirt as though to cool off, not allowing Izuku the moment he would need himself and then distract her with an endless stream of questions. Really it was all just misdirection - another skill along side stealth that she mad mastered long ago. Now if Izuku was as gullible as usual then...

"Ah? Wh-wha- guh?" Her green haired victim blurted unintelligibly, as his eyes - drawn by the movement of her hand, were drawn to her collar, and subsequently her chest. Toru wasn't stupid - Izuku wasn't the type of person to just ogle her, but the human mind was _programmed_ to track moving objects and avoid danger. Taking advantage of that was pretty much the most essential part of sleight of hand - something she hoped Izuku would pick up on and emulate using his character.

"T-T-Toru! Why!?" Izuku screeched spinning around and all but slamming his face into the table and covering his head with the core rule book in order to hide his neon red blush.

"I already told you _why_." Toru crooned before easing off and stepping out of Izuku's personal space, ignoring the pained groan that came from him at her answer. There really was nothing quite as good for relieving stress as a good prank. And she had developed _alot _of stress this week.

"Anyway, _are _you ready? For the game I mean. I thought you were done your character already?" She asked after a second observing the beleaguered boy, her voice becoming more relaxed and less teasing.

"Um, the old one got damaged and I was rushing to copy it down again." Izuku answered after a slight pause, during which a frown flickered across his features. She was kind of curious about whay could have happened, but ultimately decided not to pursue that line of questioning.

"Huh. Well as long as your ready by the time everyone gets here." She said simply.

"Oh I'm nearly done already." Izuku replied quickly, scooping the sheet up and waving it excitedly in front of himself.

"Quick. What did you have the whole thing memorized or something?" She asked, sidling around Izuku to her customary position at the head of the table and then beginning to arrange the stack of books, miniatures and dice that had been left their for her by Gen to her liking.

"Sort of? My...uh... I guess it's sort of stored in my quirk?" Izuku answered tentatively.

"Seriously? Oh man that's so cool! Imagine not having to keep a journal or notepad for all the NPC stats! Book keeping would be super easy!" Toru marveled, not bothering to look up at Izuku as she spoke.

"Yeah..." Izuku answered uncomfortably. After that the pair fell silent, deciding as though by mutual agreement that they would wait until everyone else in the Burning Eagles had arrived to resume their conversation. There was, after all, adventuring to be done - and Toru had set up _quite _the amusing introduction for Izuku's character.

She tried not to allow the evil smile of the time tested Game Master to split her face - knowing that despite her invisibility everyone around her could _tell _when she was doing it. But she must not have succeeded, because Izuku suddenly became _very _pale and afraid looking.

Good. He was already getting into character.

-ooo-

_"You awaken chained to the wall of a dark, dank cavern, __**deep **__beneath the Duchess' manor..."_

_..._

_"The guards are none to pleased by your escape, and begin to rain crossbow bolts down on you and your rescuers - The Burning Eagles."_

_..._

_" 'Please oh bard, tell me just... one more... story...' The Duchess wheezes weakly from the ground before you. It seems she was so impressed with your tall tales that she decided you must be hers! Alas, too late do you realize the mistake that you have made."_

"Pfft yeah right. What are you waiting for kid? Just heal her. You _did _take a cure spell right?" Old Gen grumbled good naturedly, looking over at a puzzled Izuku.

Izuku looked up at him from the part of the table he'd been staring at that contained the toppled miniature representing the Barrenness. He used a tissue they had placed in front of him nearly an hour ago to wipe the tears from his eyes and pointedly ignored the snickering the rest of the table - sans Toru - was leveling at him for his overly emotional reaction to the events of the session.

"Um..." he said hesitantly and then turned slightly to look at the cardboard screen separating Toru from the rest of the table.

"How do I cast a spell?" Izuku asked weakly. He had gone the whole session - the last two and a half hours to be precise - trying to treat the game as a dry run for his own use of his quirk. Since he had the same stats as his character he should - in theory - be able to use playing the game as a means to practice. By all accounts Izuku thought he had acquitted himself well. He had convinced the prison guard to free him, stolen a set of armor and a sword from the guards barracks, and handily helped the party during most of their short fights using trickery and guile.

He had not, however, cast a single spell. And while that was confusing to everyone else at the table - to Izuku, it made perfect sense. After all, he didn't actually know if he could _cast _spells in real life.

"You just declare what spell you want to cast and then roll the dice to see what happens. Same as everything else." Toru said plainly. Much as the girl liked to beat around the bush and mess around with him, when it came to her duties as a Game Master she took her duties so seriously that anyone watching could be forgiven for assuming she was a completely different person.

"Right but...uh...the spell says there's a verbal and a somatic component." Izuku said, wincing as everyone else at the table cocked their heads in confusion at him. Still he forged on, withdrawing his copy of the rule book, already turned to the page displaying the spell Cure Light Wounds on it, which he tapped once with a finger for emphasis.

"It just means your character has to do a hand gesture and then use some magic words to activate the spell." Toru clarified for him.

"You also have to touch the target. That's probably included in the gesture part of the spell though." She added almost as an after thought.

"Hmm." Izuku hummed curiously, mumbling the word 'Stats' under his breath and eyeing his health which was still a solid 9 out of 10. In the entire day, he hadn't regained a single hit point. He guessed that if he went to sleep he would heal another hit point just like that morning, but when presented with such a clear chance to test it...

"Cure light wounds." Izuku said firmly, so distracted by his musings that he completely missed the worried looks his fellow adventurers were shooting him. He pressed the pointer and middle fingers of his right hand against his wounded palm as he did so, and was pleased when a light glow and a warm feeling spread across his body, accompanied by a slurry of notifications from his Quirk.

**You have cast 'Cure Light Wounds' **

**You have used a first level spell slot! Slots remaining: One.**

**You have recovered 4 hit points!**

"Yes!" Izuku cheered, quickly unwrapping his wounded hand and finding smooth unmarred flesh beneath the bandages.

"Okay, so I want to cast Cure Light Wounds on-" he started and then faltered at the looks of obvious shock on the groups faces.

"...the Duchess?" He finished questioningly.

"Forget, _that_, did you just cast a _spell_?" Gen asked incredulously.

"I uh...yeah?" Izuku answered uncomfortably. It wasn't as though he was trying to hide his quirk from them. He just wasn't used to having a quirk to hide in the first place.

"How!?" The table yelled in unison, this time even Toru joining in.

"Well..." Izuku began before hesitantly explaining his situation to the Burning Eagles, who watched him gobsmacked. He deliberately left everything about being attacked that night out, not wanting to involve his mew friends in hos troubles. Fifteen minutes later, their game all but forgotten, Toru had practically ejected from her chair to sit closer to Izuku as he explained, and was now sitting with her head in her hands.

"So... your character sheet burned up, and now you're a D&D character." She said without - he thought anyway - looking up at him.

"Mhm." He replied, nodding easily at the question. He didn't know why Toru seemed so depressed all of a sudden. Or maybe distraught was the word.

"And you're a Bard." She continued, eliciting winces from around the table.

"Yes...?" Izuku answered again, not sure what the problem was. It was Toru after all who had told him he should play a Bard after all.

"Ooh maaan." She moaned forlornly into her hands.

"Why didn't you pick a Magusssssss." She continued before leaning forward to bonk her head invisibly on the table several times, each hit causing the dice and miniatures on it to jump and shift slightly. A tower of dice that someone had built, stacked five high fell over and spilled towards Izuku at one of the impacts, and worried about his friend he leaned forward to stop her from continuing.

"Why? What's wrong? I-I think Bards are cool! I can heal and stuff!" Izuku said hastily.

"But a Magus would have been betteerrrrr." She whined in response.

"But you said-" Izuku started in confusion.

"I know what I said! I didn't think you meant in _real life _though! A Magus would be _such _a cool Hero!" Toru barked shooting up to retort and then slumping back down in her seat.

"What she means is, Bards get away with a lot in the game that you couldn't in real life. Since a lot of it is cheating, lying and stealing. Plus, even if Bards are known for sleeping around, the second you transplant that behaviour to real life well..." Old Gen explained, trailing off with a shrug of his shoulders.

Izuku paled. He had thought that the Bard was the best choice for him. After all hadn't he originally agreed with Toru's sentiments that you could fight every problem? But if what they were saying was true then had he already messed up?

"Is... is there a way to restart?" Izuku asked hopefully.

"...you could re roll but..." Toru said, trailing off.

"Really? Then I'll just -" Izuku began but was cut off by Old Gens sour sounding voice.

"But you normally reroll after your character has _died._" He said, finishing Toru's thought and handily shutting Izuku's mouth.

"...Oh." he said after a second of staring blankly around himself.

"Okay! This is my fault so _I'll _take responsibility for it! Gimme your character sheet Zuku!" Toru said finally, shooting up and posing dramatically next to him.

"Why?" He asked in puzzlement.

"Well it's not like Bards suck or anything. For a Hero a Magus is just _better_." Toru said and then paused as if only just realizing something.

"You... _do _want to be a Hero right? A quirk like this is practically made for it..." she asked hesitantly.

"Ah... maybe? I didn't think I could get into the Hero course so I had kind of given up..." Izuku answered honestly. It still hurt to admit, but the further away he got from the decision the less unbearable the thought became.

"I was actually thinking of applying to the support class..." he finally added lamely.

"Pfft. Your a D&D character! You _have _to be a Hero!" Toru said, denying his worries immediately out of hand and causing Izuku's eyes to snap up towards her.

"Besides there's like what, ten months before the entrance exam? We just have to figure out how you level up and then the work can _really _begin. Just you wait Izuku Midoriya, when I'm done with you then _you too, will be a Hero!_" Toru crooned happily in complete defiance of her previous dour mood. Her smile and determination were short lived however, as she finally looked down to lock eyes with Izuku.

"Zuku!?" She yelped when she realized he was looking up at her and crying fitfully.

"I-I'm sorry it's just- those words. I've waited so long for someone to say them to me...!" Izuku croaked between sniffles and ragged sobs.

"Ahah... well... you know it's my fault and uh... I wouldn't mind having a friend go to school with me so..." Toru said awkwardly as she lightly tousled Izuku's hair. She didn't really know how to deal with this level of emotion from someone. She never allowed her pranks to reach a level where they would elicit such a reaction. Come to think of it she had just sort of gone and declared something pretty outrageous...

Completely unaware of Toru's inner thoughts, Izuku just continued to sob for a time. The rest of the table politely - if awkwardly - waited for him to calm down. Izuku felt... content. No, actually, despite his currently unresolved problems with his mystery assailant he actually felt _really good_. A warm feeling of acceptance flooded him and he felt a wan smile cross his face as he finally became able to speak normally.

"S-so what do I have to do?" He asked the invisible girl. Toru, not being one to pass up such a good opening walked up to Izuku and quickly pulled him into a loose head lock, using her free hand to tousle his already messy hair.

"Zuku, there exists in D&D a class of player that exists solely to ruin the fun for everyone else. A special sort of existence that has fallen to the dark side of the dice and completely given up on _roleplaying_. They live solely to create the most _bizarre and unstoppable _characters known to the game. Usually I would resent anyone who would taint my game such. But for you and only you Zuku, I will make an exception." she said, whispering into Izuku's ear, her tone growing more and more malicious sounding as she spoke.

Izuku could feel his heart beating faster and faster, equal parts trepidation and and expectation filling him as Toru spoke, continuing to ply her trade as a storyteller to raise the tension of the moment. The other Burning Eagles sent knowing glances around the table before each one of them gave a silent nodof approval to Toru, who was silently letting the moment drag out.

"Tell me Izuku, how would you like to be a _Munchkin?_" She intoned darkly.

And really, Izuku only actually had one thing to say to _that._

"Huh?"

-ooo-

**Ive been sitting on this for a while but was stuck debating if I wanted to try doing the whole pre UA arc in one shot in one stupidly huge chapter. Unfortunately, this story wont have the usual dick about at the beach time skip because of Toga, so I want to do it right since it will be Izuku's firsr real 'adventure'. I also want to do a separate page for Izuku's fully legal character sheet whenever he levels up, which could be a pain if he does it more than once in a chapter. **

**As it stands, yes the pairing for this fic will be Izuku x Toru and no, Izuku probably wont be using his Bard powers to have a harem or what have you. I have other fics for that. **


	4. Session Zero

"So... do we keep playing or-" Izuku asked timidly, tilting his head towards the table and away from Toru who was - as a side effect of leaning close enough to him to whisper into his ear - pressed quite firmly against his side. Or... softly? Both? Izuku latched on to the quandry like a drowning man at sea, forcing himself to genuinely consider the differences between the two sensations and whether or not they could be combined in order to distract himself from what he was actually feeling. Unfortunately, Toru was either very unaware of Izuku's fragile teenage heart, or simply didn't care. He couldn't really tell which was worse as she flung her arms around him in a - quite violent - hug that mutated into a sort of happy shaking motion.

"No way! I mean come on, you're a _D&D character_! Do you know how cool of a quirk that is!?" The invisible girl chirped, allowing a level of excitement to creep into her voice that Izuku wasn't quite sure he could identify.

**Sense Motive! 5! Critical Failure!**

_'Thanks I guess?' _Izuku thought as his face turned ever redder under Toru's excited jostling, and his ability to think straight became strained. It would seem that even using supernatural powers Izuku was simply destined never to understand women.

"B-But everyone else-" Izuku tried, appealing to the fact that the people here had come to play Dungeons & Dragons - not watch Izuku have a hormonal meltdown.

"Pfft. These guys are just as interested as I am, aren'tcha Gen?" Toru said dismissively, reluctantly separating herself from Izuku to look thoughtfully down at the table covered in dice, paper, and miniatures.

"I wouldn't say no to another demonstration." Gen answered easily, leaning forward to pluck his neon green dice set and elven archer figurine up. The other members of the Burning Eagle Adventuring Company mirrored the action, snatching up their personal items and quickly clearing the table of everything except for the screen Toru typically sat behind and all the various notes she kept for herself behind it.

"T-there's really not much to show. Um. U-unless someone gets hurt?" Izuku said nervously, keeping one eye on Toru and gently sliding away from the invisible girl to avoid further embarrassment. Izuku was, as previously noted on multiple occasions by almost anyone that knew him, not well known for his immense self esteem. Many other high school boys might have taken the momentary contact as an indication of interest, or at least allowed themselves the luxury of fantasizing such. Izuku however told himself the cold hard facts, repeating them in his head just to reinforce the point. As much as he considered Toru a friend, they didn't really _know_ each other that well. Her reaction - when he considered that it was coming from a girl who seemed to have committed a large portion of her time to her hobby - was almost painfully self explanatory. No, Toru didn't 'like' the dopey mop haired boy. She liked his _quirk._

_"_Pass." Toru said idly, before nodding once and rushing around the table to bundle all of her effects and books up into a neat pile on her chair, and then succinctly pushing the now clear folding table onto its side. Like watching a ghost clean up after itself, the tables legs were collapsed downward, and then the entire thing was lifted up and dragged against the far wall nearest the emergency exit.

"Um. Toru-san. What... what are you doing?" Izuku asked worriedly. He couldn't think of a lot of reasons to clear a space right after declared she was going to turn him into whatever a 'munchkin' was. If he was a betting man - which he wasn't because Izuku had always had terrible luck - he would say that the now clear area looked an awful lot like an extremely tiny arena. But that was absurd, Toru wasn't going to attack him so -

"Making space to test your quirk, duh. You never had quirk counseling or anything right? Cus you were quirkless?" The invisible girl said turning from where she had put away the large table. Izuku resisted the urge to wince when she said the word 'quirkless'. It wasn't so much that he took offence to the word itself, it was just that it featured prominently among the list of insults his childhood friend Katsuki Bakugou would lob at him on a near daily basis. Having it thrown at him out of the blue like this, in a place he considered to be safe and well... 'his' was a little jarring, even if there was no malicious intent behind it.

"Y-yeah. They just gave me a free period and told me to study." He admitted with a shrug, diverting his eyes away from the onlookers.

"A-ah. Well. Congratulations! You've got the best quirk ever! So don't- I mean- no more crying!" Toru said hurriedly, waving her arms around in a conscious display of panic. Inwardly, a traitorous part of her noted that he was just as cute when he was all teary eyed as when he was panicking over one of her pranks. But only as an observation!

_'Like when you see someone else's dress and think that it's super pretty on them! It's platonic!'_ she quickly justified to herself, while also wondering if Izuku cried like this _all the time. _

_"_Y-yeah. Right. My quirk." Izuku said hesitantly, a sense of frailness exuding from his slight frame.

"Can you cast Prestidigitation?" Gen asked suddenly, cutting through the awkward atmosphere.

"Huh?" Izuku asked at the same time as Toru let loose with a high pitched squeal that left Izuku waiting for the damage notification from his quirk.

"Prestidigitation. The most useful useless spell you'll ever cast. In Pathfinder you activate the spell, and for an hour afterward you can basically do anything a standard sleight of hand magician could do plus a bit more. Here. Make this taste like beer." The older proprietor of the store said nonchalantly, proffering his water bottle to Izuku expectantly.

"Seriously? You find out he's got the best quirk _ever_ and you're using it to circumvent your wife's ban on booze?" Toru said incredulously, spinning to face her boss.

"Hey look, so far all we know is that he can heal himself and say a few words that _sound_ like he's casting Cure Light Wounds. Can _you_ think of a better way to prove he's not just crazy other than having him cast a completely different spell?" Gen asked pointedly.

"What?! Izuku wouldn't lie like that! Besides what if he didn't _learn_ prestidigitation. There are _other_ zero level spells you know!" Toru said, the sleeve of her right arm jerking back and forth in an exaggerated manner to so that everyone watching could tell that she was thrusting her finger towards the older man with each exclamation she made.

"Oh come off it. Can you do it or not kid?" Gen grumped, ignoring his incensed employee.

"Um. Prestigi - no, Prastadigi - wait. _Prestidigitation!" _Izuku said finally, his tongue tripping over the complicated English word the first few times he attempted to say it.

**You have cast 'Prestidigitation'**

**Duration Remaining: 1h**

"So?" Gen said, shaking his half empty water bottle at Izuku.

"Do I just..." Izuku said, trailing off when he focused on the bottle of water. The second he honed his attention another window popped up above it.

**Options: Water Bottle**

**Clean**

**Hover**

**Dirty**

**Flavor**

**Change Color**

**Warm**

**Chill**

"Huh." Izuku grunted, while mentally selecting the 'Flavor' option and then focusing on beer. He had never had the stuff before, so he wasn't quite sure how it tasted, but he definitely at least knew _what_ it was so...

**You have changed the Flavor of 'Water Bottle' to Beer!**

"I... think it worked?" Izuku said keeping his head down and away from the curious glances of everyone else in the room. Gen eyed him suspiciously for a second - no doubt having been expecting some kind of visual display of power - but then shrugged and tilted his water bottle backwards for a deep gulp of the clear liquid within.

The other occupants of the room looked on expectantly, waiting for the store owners verdict. Slowly he lowered his bottle of water to stare at it perplexed.

"Well the water still tastes like water but..." he said with a frown before darting his tongue out to tentatively lick the plastic rim of the water bottle itself.

"The bottle tastes like booze. It's like the most disgusting popsicle ever." He marveled after a while, pointedly shifting the - now mostly empty - bottle of water away from the grasping hands of his fellow adventurers.

Wait. The water bottle? Not the water? Izuku had just assumed he had the right target when his notification had indicated the words 'water bottle'. He hadn't realized there was a distinction between the bottle and the actual substance contained within. Was _everything _he did going to require he be so specific?

"Told you! Bleh!" Toru said in triumph, once more saying aloud the onomotapeia for sticking ones tongue out.

"I'm convinced." Gen agreed easily with a shrug, still licking his water bottle as though it was the most normal thing in the world.

"So... should we get back to the game now?" Izuku asked hopefully.

"Probably should. Assuming you can get our rogue god over there to focus." Gen grunted, jabbing a finger towards the hovering heap of clothing that was Toru. The invisible girl didn't seem particularly interested in returning to the game however. Or listening to her fellows. Or... well anything except Izuku's quirk actually.

"Hey, hey, how does combat work? Do you have to like, take turns?" She asked, miming an over exaggerated boxing stance and swinging her fists through the air in front of her. All the while she was bouncing up and down like a child on a sugar high, completely oblivious to how s_trange _she was acting. Even to Izuku, who hadn't known her very long at all, Toru seemed almost impossibly pleased with the situation she found herself in.

"Maybe we should... huh. I don't actually know." Izuku said, stopping halfway through his suggestion that the group break up for the evening so that their Dungeon Master could regain her composure.

"Wanna find out?" Toru asked pleasantly. Almost... too pleasantly Izuku thought. A suspicion that was borne out when he oened his mouth to refuse and was greeted by the sensation of something lightly slapping him upside the head.

**You have taken 1 non lethal damage!**

**Surprise Round Over! **

**Initiative! 16! **

Ah, well. He guessed he was in combat then. Was he supposed to do something now or...

**4 seconds remain in your turn!**

Wait what? He _did _have to take turns? That was insane! Each individual turn in a D&D game took roughly six seconds! How was he supposed to think about and consider his response to _anything _if that was his only window to act!?

**2 seconds remain in your turn!**

Okay, he had to calm down. He just needed to... with shocking clarity Izuku realized that while he had been panicking, everyone else in the room had remained almost completely still. It was as if time had slowed to a crawl for everyone but him. The sleeve of Toru's right arm - the one she had smacked him with - was retracting slowly and her other arm was coming up in an attempt to repeat the action.

Curious to see what he could do in this state of slowed time, Izuku raised his hand and prepared to cast a spell when -

**Your turn has ended!**

**You have taken 1 non lethal damage!**

"Owe!" He yelped, backing away and putting a hand in the air imploring Toru to stop. She wasn't hitting him very hard - only about as strongly as a mother chastising an unruly child really - but it still stung. And while his quirk told him he was being dealt 'non lethal' damage, he was still hesitant to allow his health to reach zero.

"So!?" Toru said expectantly.

"It hurt!" Izuku barked back without thinking, tears in his eyes.

"Toru." Gen said, the monosyllabic admonishment coming out with a level of cold fury that finally managed to shock the invisible girl out of her obsessive fervor.

"I- I mean- sorry Zuku!" She blurted after a second of whipping back and forth between the small boy and her boss.

"It's just, this is so cool, and I really want to know more about your quirk and that seemed like the best way to- I- I'll get the first aid kit!" She said, her words coming out rushed and apologetic before she darted off into the employees only section of the store.

"You have to forgive her. She was really excited when you started coming around you know?" Gen stated off handedly, sidling up to Izuku and placing a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"I didn't mean to yell at her. It just really hurt." Izuku said weakly, still rubbing his stinging cheek. He really hadn't meant to get Toru in trouble. Admittedly, he would have preferred to test the combat applications of his new quirk in a slightly more controlled setting, and he definitely didn't appreciate being suddenly assaulted, but he _had _learned something new. Plus...

"I... I'm used to it anyway..." He mumbled, not fully aware that he had spoken out loud until a loud voice shocked him out of his thoughts.

"That's not right!" Toru's commanding voice declared from where she had just emerged from the employee only area of the store. In one hand she was carrying a white rectangular box with a large red cross emblazoned on it's front, and in the other, she held a plastic bag full of ice. Both of which were being waved about over her head without much care for their contents.

"Huh?" Izuku said, confused at the sudden outburst.

"I said, that's not right! When someone hits you, you have to get mad! When someone yells at you, you have to yell back! If you just let people ignore how you feel then they'll _always _treat you like your invisible!" She half yelled, and half hissed at him. With quick solid steps, she darted between two other members of the party and jerked a chair out behind Izuku, then pushed him gently into it.

"A-also, you know, you shouldn't just let people bully you ok? Even me." She said a bit more nervously immediately afterward, dropping the first aid kid next to him and handing him the bag of ice to press against his stinging cheek. Izuku didn't really know what to say to that. In an abstract sense, he knew that this was the kind of thing his mother - timid as she was - would say to him if she knew about how he was often bullied at school. But his mother's anxious nature and constant guilt over his quirklessness were precisely the reasons why he _couldn't_ tell her about it. She couldn't actually do anything to stop it, and in the end, it would only result in her feeling even worse than she already did. That was why he kept so much to himself. When he was younger he was always running back and forth trying to prove everyone wrong. Sure the doctor had _said_ he didn't have a quirk, but back then he just _knew_ the man was wrong. Little Izuku had put himself in one dangerous or stupid situation after the other until finally he had been _forced_ to accept the truth. And all the while he could remember the omnipresent look of guilt his mother watched him with. He didn't want to go back to those days, and so she remained none the wiser as to his situation.

Even then... his teachers, his fellow students, not once had any of them ever actually _spoken_ to him about the obvious problem. On multiple occasions, Bakugou had threatened him in full view of a member of the faculty only for them to do absolutely nothing about it. That was the kind of society he lived in after all - one where the potential to be a great hero was worth more than anything else. And yet here Toru was, telling him to fight back no matter what, even if it was against her.

"Actually you really helped!" Izuku blurted in a haphazard attempt to change the subject. He pressed the bag of ice against his cheek with a wince as the ice cold sensation spread across his skin, and then continued speaking at a rapid pace, quickly firing off every observation he had been able to make in the - extremely brief - moment of combat.

"After you smacked me it said something about a surprise round, a-and then it rolled initiative and said it was my turn! And then time slowed down! Everything was moving really slow! B-but it was only for six seconds!" He rattled off, even as Toru withdrew a cream from the first aid kit and shoved his hand out of the way so she could lightly apply it to him.

"So you _are_ a D&D Character. Kind of anyway." Toru mused excitedly, though with an obvious effort put in to subdue her enthusiasm now.

"Kind of?" Izuku asked, not sure in what _possible way _he could be any _more_ like a game character. He had health, and skills for christs sake!

"Yeah I mean, it kind of looks like you can move and stuff when it's not your turn still right? That'd be cheating in D&D. It almost seems like your 'turn' is just to help you think." Toru opined, lowering the hand holding the cream and pulling a large bandaid out to place on top of Izuku's cheek.

"..._if _I can act outside my turn you mean." Izuku pointed out, the previous moments awkwardness forgotten as he delved into the mechanics of his quirk.

"We could probably test it by-" Toru replied easily as she too fell into speculation over how the mechanics of her favourite game would translate to real life.

"Ehem." Gen faux coughed from beside the two who had, in a manner of speaking, largely fallen into their own little world.

"Eh?" Izuku and Toru yelped as their attention was dragged back to the rest of the room, forcing them to acknowledge the fact that there were, in fact, other people present.

"Haaah. Look, I'll let it go today okay? But lets not do this again next week alright?" Gen said sternly, his grandfatherly appearance and bearing firmly ruined by his continued licking of his water bottle.

"S-sorry." Izuku said demurely, shrinking back into himself in shame.

"A..hahah... don't worry about it Zuku. It was my fault anyway." Toru said just a tad too loudly, embarrassment obvious in her tone.

"I just got a bit carried away is all you see." She continued, slapping him on the back as she stood up next to him with the first aid kit in hand. They stood in awkward silence for a second neither of them really sure what to say but both of them wanting to say _something_.

"Hey." Came Gen's voice once more, exasperation for the teenage drama he was being forced to sit through writ large across his face. He proffered his water bottle to Izuku, wiggling it slightly to draw the green haired boys attention.

"Can you make this cold?" He said once he was sure he was actually being listened too.

"Y-yes!" Izuku stuttered. Izuku stuttered _alot_ actually now that he thought about it. Was that normal? Shouldn't his 18 Charisma do something about that? It definitely hadn't made him more _attractive_ but he had to assume it did _something_.

"I'll just... clean up." Toru said, immediately deflating at the missed opportunity to continue speaking with Izuku.

Izuku couldn't help but frown at the slightly depressed tone in her voice as she spoke. It wasn't something he would have taken notice of under normal circumstances. After all, he was a social pariah for the most part. Picking up on the nuance in other peoples speech wasn't even _on_ his list of skills let alone near the top of said list.

**Sense Motive! 17! **

Except for the fact that, it very specifically _was_ on his list of skills. A list that he could call up and look at on a whim now that he had his Quirk. He had to wonder at that. He _definitely_ had a quirk. But if he assumed that it had become active because he had come into contact with Dungeons & Dragons then... what? Were there other people with quirks that just didn't present themselves because the requirements to activate them were hilariously specific? If you're quirk was the ability to survive in Lava, then how would you be able to tell without first performing an action that - without prior knowledge - would appear suicidal?

Ah. He was overthinking things again. Okay so... Toru wanted to keep talking about his quirk. He could solve that. He just... he just had to talk to her about maybe meeting sometime outside the store. By themselves. In a... private... setting. Like a date. B-but absolutely not a date becausethatwouldimply-

Izuku could feel his eye beginning to twitch again as the stress of his every quickening thoughts made itself known. Toru was his friend. His _friend_ wanted to talk about his quirk. That was... pretty normal right? Since everyone had a quirk and all. So he just had to drum up the courage to talk to her.

"Come on, when Mount Lady was fighting in town yesterday she didn't worry about accidentally hurting anybody. She _knew_ she was going to save the day!" Izuku muttered rapidly to himself as he lifted a hand and rapidly ran through the list of options for Prestidigation to chill Gen's water bottle.

**You have used Inspire Courage! By telling the story of a great hero you have inspired yourself and those around you! **

**+1 to Saves against Charm & Fear effects! +1 to Attack and Damage rolls!**

**Duration: One Round! Continue the story to extend the duration!**

The list of notifications flickered across his vision as fast as all the others had, far too fast for a normal human to have even been able to perceive them. Still, Izuku seemed to gain an intuitive understanding of their meaning as he saw them, completely negating his need to actually read them. He wondered idly why that intuitive understanding couldn't apply to his quirk as a whole but quickly chose not to get to far into that particular thought. As it was his quirk _already_ came with a literal rulebook, there was no use complaining about it when that was more than most other people got.

Accompanied by those notifications thought, was a sudden surge of well... courage. Izuku suddenly didn't find the idea of asking Toru to hang out and talk sometime _nearly_ as daunting as he had a few seconds ago. This thought caused him to blink though. How long was a Round? He knew a single characters turn was about six seconds, and he knew a round was over when every character had taken a turn...

Didn't that mean that a round _had_ no set length? How was he supposed to judge that? One more thing to test later he supposed.

All of that shot across his mind in the single moment it took him to turn towards Toru and say;

"Hey Toru if you want we could -hrk!"

Izuku wished he could have completed the sentence. Four seconds ago it seemed like it was the easiest thing in the world. Until about half way through the statement - when the effects of his ability had run out and suddenly he had remembered he was talking to a pretty girl about spending time together. Hence the strangled choking noise.

Toru, who had turned fully towards Izuku at his words, felt her shoulders slump slightly at his sudden silence. She should have known better. Yeah the shop was her domain, and yeah she let her mask slip more here than anywhere else, but that was no excuse for assaulting the boy. She had spent years preparing to be a Hero. She took Judo lessons (because throws and locks were hard to evade when you couldn't see your opponent), she excercised and most importantly of all she _sparred. _As a Dungeon Master she knew better than most what it took to be a Hero - that being, alot of combat mostly. So the second Izuku had claimed that he too was considering UA well... she had just skipped ahead a bit is all. It hadn't occurred to her how woefully unprepared the shorter boy might be. To Toru, highschool was going to be much like an extremely long dungeon. One hundred floors at least. The only reason she didn't carry a million tools and gadgets on her was the fact that bags of holding weren't real.

Still, even though she _told _herself all of that, she still felt almost painfully embarassed by the whole thing. Of course Izuku wouldn't want to talk to her after this. She had literally smacked him upside the head!

Unaware of the inner turmoil he had incited in his invisible friend, Izuku took a deep breath. And then another, and another, until - much to the amusement of the rest of the group - he began to speak.

"W-when Allmight saves people, he always has a smile on his face! Because as a Hero - no, as the Symbol of Peace, he wants everyone he saves to know that everything is going to be okay! So that's why-" Izuku said, his inflection transitioning from pained and almost embarassed to smooth and confident with each passing word. With his last few words he had managed to look directly at the spot he judged Torus face to be, and paused to plaster a terrible imitation of Allmights own smile on his face.

"Do you want to hang out together this summer Toru? I still don't know what a munchkin is so..." he said with all the calm confidence he could muster. Toru - who had been watching Izuku in utter confusion until that point, felt a wide smile break out over her own face as relief filled her.

It would have been a fairly cute moment to the watching adults except for several factors.

One, Izuku looked like a lunatic. His smile, while clearly an attempt to copy Allmight, was too wide and toothy, and made him look like a scared animal barring its teeth.

Two, Toru, who was obviously invisible, had no real way of getting her expression or feelings across to the people around her in any way that could be considered subtle. As a result, she had developed into a women who had absurdly exaggerated body language to compensate. This was something she did largely unconsciously, and without willingly clamping down on the impulse, had very little control over. This left the flustered girl flapping her arms through the air at a rapid pace that made her look almost as though she were trying to fly with them.

Toru was the first to notice the slight guffawing coming from everybody else in the room, snapping her out of her stupor. She took one look at the awkwardly smiling Izuku, and then back to the Burning Eagles before her voice came out, bubbly and pleased as ever.

"Sure 'Zuku lets exchange numbers! As for you four." She added, turning her entire body to make sure they knew where she was looking.

"Rocks fall, everybody dies." She said evily, reminding them that - while poking fun at her now and again was fine - she was in fact, for the very limited time that they were playing D&D, their god.

The Burning Eagles, including Gen, who had until that point had been prevaricating between being amused that their young Dungeon Master was having such a hard time with someone else her age, and being annoyed that they had largely wasted their friday night on this, each blanched. They turned towards each other with obvious distress on their faces, silently conferring in the way only a long term group of friends can.

And then they simultaneously threw Gen both forward and under the bus.

"Sorry Hagakure-chan, we were just following his lead!"

"Blame the elf perv!"

"Please dont kill us!"

Despite being uncomfortably aware of the sound of his own heart beat as he withdrew his old cellphone, Izuku couldn't help buy stifle a laugh at the groups antics. For a brief second he felt as though he were meeting the Burning Eagles for the first time all over again, and he was glad for it.

Toru and Izuku quickly exchanged numbers before separating, neither of them quote sure how to feel at the moment. Still, thinking on it, he had learned more about his quirk, played (some) D&D, cast his first spell, and gotten closer to Toru.

Today had been a good day.

-ooo-

Izuku knew he shouldn't have tempted fate. He was, if nothing else, exceptionally unlucky at the _best _of times. He was practically fate's whipping boy at this point.

True, he should have seen this coming given then giant bolded text hanging under the Journal portion of his character sheet. And true, she _had _said she would see him tommorow, which was technically now today.

But as he stepped out of the hobby shop, and directly into the open arms of the blond girl from the night before - who had pivoted into position to ensnare him before he even registered her presence - he couldn't help but feel this could have been avoided.

"I found you~" she cooed at dreamily as she pressed herself firmly into his chest. She tilted her head upward to look curiously into his face with her too wide smile and hummed at him expectantly.

Izuku had to force himself not to let the cold dread her sweet words caused him deep in the pit of his stomache.

"H-hey." Izuku hesitantly, his eyes darting towards the schoolbag slung lazily over the girls right shoulder. The one he was fairly certain contained a murder weapon. Or... a potential murder weapon? He guessed most police reports would just call it a weapon and leave it at that but -

"Hi! So, where are we going!?" The girl asked excitedly, tightening her grip on him enough that her nails began to dig painfully into his back.

"Hu-hmmm." Izuku blurted, his confused 'huh' morphing into a contemplative sound the second his mind caught up fully with the details of his current situation. He _had _technically tricked her yesterday by offering to go on a date with her but... Not only had he forgotten his own ruse, he had never bothered to figure out what to do if forced to follow through on it.

_'Okay. I can do this. Im a... a Bard now! I just have to pretend I'm playing a game!' _He thought, and a sense of calm purpose fell over him.

"Th-theres not much open at this hour so..." Izuku said, pausing to think through his next words carefully. Or at least he tried to until he noticed the sudden look of disappointment and - dare he say - possibly even mild disgust cross her face.

"Dinner! Lets go have dinner!" He hurriedly said, watching her expression warily for the moment she decided to reach for her knife. He was sure she would do it to. She had been ready to kill him for basically nothing before. How violent would she get if she thought he was tricking her? He actually didn't want to think about it for too long, because he might start shaking if he did that. He half expected his half assed, poorly thought out suggestion to be the trigger for his own demise but instead his mystery girl's face took on a slightly surprised expression for a moment before exploding into that too wide, too happy smile of hers all over again.

"Really!? Oh my god there's this place I've always wanted to go!" She tittered at him, bouncing from foot to foot like an athlete before a run and stepping away from him.

"Uh..." Izuku said unintelligibly. He almost couldn't understand what was going on anymore. Why was she _confused_ by his suggestion for a moment there? He'd never been on a date before but was going out to eat not a thing couples did in real life? He'd seen enough fictional dates to get the gist of things, and he _thought_ he could pretty faithfully translate the more realistic parts to this encounter but if he was completely off base then-

"You're funny when you mutter like that." The girl said, suddenly appearing entirely too close to him again then distancing herself as if it had never happened.

"You get this look right? Like someone just stabbed you and you don't know what to do about it. It's _great_." She continued gleefully, turning and skipping a distance up the road before turning to smile at him menacingly over one shoulder. Or... he thought it was menacingly. He really wished he could understand what the hell this girl was thinking so that he could-

**Sense Motive! 14!**

Okay well. There was that. On the one hand, his quirk was telling him that she _was_ genuinely happy to be doing something with him. On the other, it also hadn't said 'Success' at the end of the roll - which meant it could just be screwing with him. It hadn't occurred to him that it was possible until he had played the game that night, but it was entirely within a Dungeon Masters power to tell you false information in order to trick you into thinking you had succeeded at a roll - when you had really failed.

"Coming or what?" The girl said, her tone sliding slightly closer to uncertain and away from 'disturbingly happy'. The smile was still there though, which was scary as all hell, so rather than disappoint her he rushed up to her side, stretching an arm out tentatively like he'd seen in that one drama his mom loved to watch. Granted, that drama took place a long time ago, and the main character wore a top hat still but... romance was romance right?

The pair walked through the late evening together for a time in awkward silence. Izuku would have liked to judge what the girl next to him was thinking from her facial expression, but honestly, he couldn't yet tell the difference between 'happy', 'satisfied', and 'about to stab you' quite yet with this girl. They all looked the same to him. What's worse, she had a perpetual flush to her face, like she had just finished running a marathon. He struggled to remember if that was consistent with the last time they had encountered one another but drew a blank. He had been much more focused on the knife than he had on her at the time.

With shocking clarity Izuku realized that even though he was 'with' this girl, he didn't know the first thing about her. He didn't know what school her uniform was from because there was no discernible emblem on the thing. He didn't how old she was because he had automatically assumed she was the same age as him. Heck, he didn't even know her _name_ which was kind of the entire point of playing along with her instead of just running screaming into the night like he would have preferred. The officer _had_ said he could do more about her if he could actually identify her after all.

"Izuku!" He blurted, immediately deciding that he hated himself.

"Eh?" The girl said, shifting slightly away from him in surprise as he called out.

"My name I mean. It's Izuku." He said hesitantly, only realizing a few seconds after the fact that he should have used a fake name. Then again, he doubted this girl could find out much about him just from his given name. It wasn't _that_ unique.

"Oh! Uh. I mean. T-toga." She said, the smile on her face becoming slightly less prominent at the words. She darted a glance to Izuku as though unsure of how he would respond to the name before turning forward again to hide her expression from him.

"N-nice to meet you. I mean! We met! Yesterday! But I mean-" Izuku said, realizing how stupid it sounded a few seconds later and then eventually giving up on trying to salvage the statement. Instead he changed tracks completely in an attempt to gather more information on the girl in front of him.

"W-what's your quirk?" Izuku said weakly, resisting the urge to allow his face to fall into his hands so he could weep at his own ineptitude. He felt simultaneously really dumb and _exceptionally_ terrible at this. Wasn't he supposed to get some quirk based assistance on this social interaction thing? It seemed like everything else his quirk did just worked automatically, but his conversation based skills and abilities seemed bizarrely hard to trigger when he actually wanted them to.

Wait. Did... did he actually have to _know_ what to _say_ when he was trying to convince someone of something? Did his skill just assist him when he actually put the effort in... and not activate at all when it was impossible to do anything but fail?! That was useless to him! He wouldn't know what to say to a Genie if it asked him for a magical wish! How was he supposed to-

"Oh look were here!" The girl squealed, completely ignoring his question to take him by the hand and lead him through the front doors of... a McDonalds?

"This is it?" Izuku asked without thinking, before quickly checking to see if he had offended Toga by speaking.

"I-it's open late! A-and all the girls I know come here with their boyfriends after uh, you know..." The blonde said, swiftly leading him up to the counter to order. Izuku stared at her with his mouth half open, his face going from a slight blush of embarrassment to a fluorescent red that could have lit the entire restaurant if the lights had been off.

"Two meals!" Toga said with a determined voice that faltered when the attendant at the cash register just stared at her.

"...Which ones?" The pimple faced teen behind the register said blandly, pointing a finger towards the giant menu that hung above his head. Izuku watched on worriedly as Toga's hand twitched slightly towards her bag then stopped when she caught him in her peripheral vision. Time stood frozen for a second, and Izuku realized that he should probably do something before this McDonalds employee got themselves McStabbed in the Face.

"Number Three's please!" Izuku blurted, not sure what that particular menu item was off the top of his head but certain that the menu _must_ at least go up that high. With utmost care he slid forward to wrap Toga's knife hand in his own, a gesture that would have been romantic if it hadn't primarily been to stop the girl from reaching her bag easily.

"D-don't worry about it okay?" Izuku stuttered at her, sliding his backpack off of his shoulder and fumbling one handed through it for his wallet. He wasn't about to let the girls hand go _now_ after all.

**Bluff! 26! Success! **

"Uhuh." The girl said dumbly, her gaze falling to lock on to his hand where it was intertwined with hers. Then her smile returned once more in full force, so completely at odds with what a smile was supposed to represent that even the clerk flinched slightly as he saw it.

"S-so. Your quirk?" Izuku said again as they waited in the almost completely empty restaurant. The second the words left his mouth her expression stiffened. Her smile remained by her eyes narrowed into slits, and she leaned forward to gaze at his left hand with an almost serpentine coldness. For a second he wasn't sure exactly what it was she was doing, until he remembered that not more than a few hours ago there had been a fairly sizeable cut on that hand. A cut that he'd gotten convincing this crazy girl not to kill him in the first place. Izuku felt his entire body go still as she slowly looked up at him, her catlike eyes glinting in the dim lighting. There was a... pressure there. An almost palpable malice that emanated from her, like there was a much larger _scarier_ creature hiding somewhere behind her.

And then she clicked her tongue and leaned away, no longer scrutinizing him.

"You better not leave." She said somberly. It was the most serious, sort of sane sounding thing he'd heard from her yet, and it filled him with a cold dread. Because it showed that not only was she completely out of her mind, she was _smart_ and completely out of her mind. Or at least... rational enough not to let her insanity be detrimental to her personal health and survival.

_'Thank you The Gamer. Seriously. Thank you so much. I swear I'll never complain about failing rolls ever again!' _Izuku thought feverishly, realizing - not for the first time - that he probably would be dead right now if he hadn't had his quirk to support him yesterday night in that alley. He didn't know it yet, but he had just undergone one of his first baptisms as a tabletop gamer - that being, praying to his dice.

"W-Why would I l-leave? he said, barely restraining the violent shake that threatened to turn his sentence completely unintelligible. Instead of answering him Toga merely pried her hand from his own grip, silently taking her tray of food as it appeared at the counter and then proceeding further in to the restaurant.

"T-Toga-san?" Izuku called after her somewhat alarmed. He was perfectly aware that women, teenage women specifically, were known for their fickleness. But that didn't change the fact that every errant change in tone or posture from this girl made him feel like his life was in danger. Feeling a bead of sweat dribble down the small of his back, Izuku quickly willed his status screen into view as he grabbed his own tray of food and followed after her.

He was back down to Eight out of Ten hit points. He had One first level spell available - which could either be Cure Light Wounds or Disguise Self, and Prestidigitation was still active. He'd only played a single session of D&D so far but he thought that was an _okay_ way to start a fight. In a pinch he could always slip into a crowd and cast Disguise Self. He just had to make sure that he didn't end up wasting his last spell on healing.

"Are- I mean- Is everything okay?" Izuku said, with a slight wince. He would _love_ if his 18 Charisma could kick in and help him get a coherent sentence in. Unless that's not what Charisma did. He knew Charisma was a measure of a characters personal magnetism among other things, but that concept was so vague... A Sorcerer's Charisma and a Bard's Charisma were bound to express themselves differently so... actually hadn't he been stuttering _way _more since getting his quirk? Did... was his stutter somehow a likeable character trait? Was his quirk _exaggerating it?_

"I'm fine." Toga said flatly, her canine like teeth crunching down brutally on a french fry as she watched him pensively. Well. As pensively as someone who's perpetually smiling can seem anyway.

"Y-you don't sound fine?" Izuku offered. He wasn't actually sure why he _cared_ to be honest. Well, except that if she got mad she might stab him. Actually what was he thinking, that was an _amazing_ reason to care! Toga continued to stare at him pensively for a few more seconds before the manic light returned to her eyes, which widened disturbingly.

"Hey, hey~ gimme your hand 'kay?" She said suddenly, sticking her own hand out expectantly.

"O...kay?" Izuku said hesitantly, sticking his hand out slowly while mentally priming himself to use his Fascinate ability. He hadn't had the opportunity to try it yet but _in theory_ it should work just like Inspire Courage. All he had to do was start telling a story and everyone listening to him should sort of... freeze. Then he could just keep talking until he was out of earshot, cast Disguise Self, and run like hell.

The girls hand shot out like a bullet, clamping down on his own wrist with a bone shattering grip left Izuku waiting for the notification that combat had begun. When it didn't, and she didn't immediately do anything else besides examine his hand he began to relax slightly - until she started to rummage around in her bag.

"You know, you know~ I stabbed the guy I liked yesterday you know? Not you~ I mean I totally like you too! Aaaaand I stabbed you. But not you." She said jovially, withdrawing her knife from her bag, which she hid from view by keeping close to her body.

"Wha-" Izuku said confused and scared out of his mind. Then like lightning the knife whipped forward, carving an identical line across his recently healed hand.

**You have taken 4 Slashing Damage!**

"Hrk!" Izuku grunted, realizing that the girl in front of him had done _half _of his current health in damage all at once. Blood seeped from his hand in a slow oozing motion, directly onto the open hamburger directly beneath it. He tried to jerk his hand away, irrationally more worried about ruining her food than _literally dying_ but found himself unable to break her iron grip no matter how much strength he put into the effort. When enough of his blood had fallen onto the meat patty that it looked like just another condiment she let go of him, quickly putting the top bun back onto her burger and swishing it around slightly to mix his blood in with the mustard and ketchup already present on it.

"Ah~" The girl sighed ecstatically, now _definitely_ blushing furiously as she smiled dopily at the irreversibly ruined burger. Then, much to Izuku's growing horror, she bit deeply into the burger, moaning loudly the entire time. She chewed once, then twice, and then swallowed before kicking her feet excitedly beneath the table and glancing at him like she had forgotten he was even there for a second.

"That's my quirk. It makes me _love_ blood. Its beautiful, and delicious and exciting and arousing and just- it's everything! _Everything!_" She gasped at him, taking another happy bite of her burger.

"But you're going to run away now right?" She said with an almost bored, _resigned_ tone to her voice. Izuku was kind of getting whiplash from her. She was bouncing back and forth between manic and perfectly normal faster than he could keep up. Not that he'd be able to keep up all that well with a normal girl either. He was kind of a chump that way.

"I-" Izuku paused, realizing that he _was_ halfway out of his seat and aimed towards the doorway.

"S-sorry." He said slowly, sliding back into his seat. Toga merely lifted an eyebrow at him. Her knife, he noticed, lay haphazardly on the table next to her, like she didn't care who saw it anymore.

"Really! I'm sorry!" Izuku repeated himself, seating himself more firmly.

"So... you uhm. W..weren't going to kill me?" Izuku asked slowly, trying to get everything straight in his head. He could... kind of... see how... no wait. She had _still _pulled a knife on him in an alley. That was _definitely_ criminal behavior.

"I was thinking about it~ I mean, you're cute but you'd look waaaaay cuter all cut up." She said, her face turning dreamy for a second before snapping back to an almost normal facial expression. Izuku flinched away from her again, no longer bothering to clamp down on the impulse.

"Is it... I mean do you _have_ to have blood? L-like is your quirk 'Vampire' or something?" Izuku asked, his curiosity overpowering his self preservation instincts.

"Nah. I just _need_ it you know? I thought I didn't but then I confessed to this guy and my heart was beating so fast and he was so warm and-" She cut off suddenly, apparently realizing that she had begun to babble.

"So it's like an addiction?" Izuku stated, now on much more familiar ground. Women? Nope. Not in a million years. Quirks? Yes. Absolutely. He could have this conversation any day of the week. As someone who - until recently - didn't _have_ a quirk, he considered _every_ quirk cool. He'd even done a page in one of his Hero development Journal's on the kid who's power was having a foot long neck at will. Now _that_ was a useless power.

Toga stared at him blankly for a few seconds, taking another few bites of her burger that sent her into ecstatic shaking each time.

"Yeah! You know everyone tastes different!? I didn't! I've only had like, two people now but oooooh my goooooood." She groaned, seeming to have found a sort of middle ground between her completely over the top persona and her plain highschool girl one.

"Huh. Um. Toga-San? Could you uh. Not stab me again? For a few days at least?" Izuku said slowly. He... well he wouldn't say he _trusted_ Toga because there was clearly something very wrong with her. But if her _quirk_ was what made her act that way then... he could sort of get it? Hound Dog, the Hound Hero was well... he was a dog person. He sniffed fire hydrants. He barked at passing emergency services vehicles. He was a good hero but there was _definitely_ a point when his quirk seemed to almost overtake his personality. And Hound Dog's quirk was... well it was pretty benign all things considered.

"What? But your delish!" She complained immediately, waving her burger infront of him pointedly. Temporarily unsure of what to say to that for a second Izuku just sort of stared at Toga until his brain kicked in and reminded him that he could _die._

"My uh... my quirk gives me kind of a health bar? Like in a video game. If you do too much damage to me I'll die - even if you only cut my hands." Izuku explained, quietly muttering 'Cure Light Wounds' under his breath and then wiping his finger along the open wound.

**You have cast 'Cure Light Wounds'**

**You have used a first level spell slot! Slots Remaining: None**

**You have recovered 5 hit points!**

The text was quickly accompanied by the warm glow of the wound on his hand closing, leaving Izuku at a comfortable Nine out of Ten hit points. It occurred to him that while right now he was... well he was about as, if not significantly _less_ difficult to kill as a normal person, once he got some levels under his belt he would be pretty durable. Well, provided getting stabbed in the heart didn't completely invalidate his quirk and therefore kill him anyway.

"But you can heal!" Toga whined again, her hand twitching towards her knife the second the blood seeping from his wound vanished in a puff.

"I can only do that once or twice a day!" Izuku retorted, leaning away from the girl as she stretched forward to trying and grab his hand once more. They stared at each other awkwardly for a few seconds before the both of them broke out laughing. Suddenly Izuku felt significantly less in danger just from being around this girl. Oh he _absolutely_ made sure to keep her knife in view at all times, but she seemed much more well, _human_ to him than she had yesterday. When he had come that night he had been hard pressed to remember Toga as anything except an extremely menacing and dangerous presence. He hadn't noticed the little things that denoted her as just another teenager, like the rings around her eyes or the sunken look to her cheeks. Actually...

"When's the last time you slept?" Izuku asked suddenly, squinting at her with sudden suspicion.

"Uh... what day is it?" Toga answered absent mindedly.

"Friday?" Izuku said then glanced around the restaurant in search of a clock.

"Probably closer to Saturday now though." He admitted easily, glad he had already arranged with his mother not to be home until the morning - when he was expecting his aborted first D&D session to finish.

"Then two days ago." She answered simply, flicking away a french fry and looking away from him.

"Toga-san!" Izuku admonished immediately, unknowingly mimicking his mother on those nights that she caught him up late watching Hero videos.

"Well I can't go home! I just told you I stabbed a guy!" She retorted instantly. Honestly, with the exception of her occasional - very distracting - moans she seemed almost normal now that she'd had some of his blood.

"Just explain it to the police! Did he die!?" Izuku shot back.

"I don't... think so?" She answered hesitantly. Still not looking at him.

"You don't know." Izuku accused - no, _stated_.

"I don't- it's just- he cut his finger and it smelled _so good_." She crooned, blinking and then shaking her head slightly to prevent herself from devolving back into the hour long diatribe on the joys of her substance of choice.

"Then we have to see if he's okay! And then _tell the police!_" Izuku said pointedly.

"Pft. So what? I can go to jail? Besides if I go back I'll just starve until I do something bad again." She said with only a tinge of sadness to her voice. Izuku knew _that_ tone. It was the one he had used whenever someone asked him about his dreams once he found out he didn't, and would never have, a quirk. The words might change, but that tone never did, because it was a tone of voice you used when you had resigned yourself to your fate. And Toga, for whatever reason, seemed resigned to... what exactly?

"So what you're just going to wander the streets and attack random people?" Izuku asked, trying to better understand what her plan apparently was.

"W-what! It works for Stain! A-and he's totally a Hero! He kills bad guys!" She said petulantly.

"He's a murderer _and_ his last three victims were _Heroes_!" Izuku replied, his annoyance at the whole situation temporarily overcoming his usual meekness. Honestly, what was he even doing here. He could safely leave this girl right now, and he was fairly certain she wouldn't come looking for him. He could see now that even _she_ wasn't insane enough to have believed he genuinely wanted to go on a date with her. She wouldn't have hesitated to explain part of her quirk to him if she did. No, Toga had just wanted _someone_ to accept her for who she was, even if she had to lie to herself to get it.

And that was just _sad_. Not to mention, Izuku had no idea what kind of a path she would tread if he left her alone now. Clearly not a good one though.

"H-how long does it take for you to go... you know..." Izuku twirled his finger at his temple in the universally understood sign for crazy.

"A while? I went through all of middle school without a problem... mostly." She said, tilting her head at him. A small part of Izuku's mind noted that if she was already out of middle school then she was probably older than him by at least a year. Which was weird because she was so... childish.

"Th-then you can have my blood! Sometimes!" Izuku said, shrinking into his seat when Toga stood suddenly to stare down at him with that overbearing smile of hers.

"Really?" She said.

"O-only if you go back home! And to school!" Izuku added.

**Diplomacy! 21! Success! **

Toga hovered over him for a few more seconds before retreating to her own seat to finish her food. Silence reigned between the two of them for a few more seconds before she spoke suddenly.

"Fine. Once a day!" She said decisively.

"Once a month!" Izuku retorted. The entire offer was predicated on being able to use Cure Light Wounds to mostly negate any damage dealt to him. If he had to waste a spell _every day_ to that effect he would be severely hampering himself.

"Every two days!" Toga replied shrewdly, eyeing his now healed hand.

"Once a week! I don't _like_ being stabbed you know!" Izuku said, crossing his arms and huffing to get his point across.

"Fine! But only 'cus your cute when your cranky! If they put me in jail you have to visit okay?!" She said, lifting her knife and pointing it at him for emphasis before sliding it back into her schoolbag.

"They aren't- you know their are whole legal defenses for this right? If anything you're parents could get child neglect charges for not helping you!" Izuku said with a shrug. Their had been _a lot_ of weird quirks over the years. Needing blood for whatever reason wasn't so rare as to have never occurred, nor was the law so draconian as to immediately punish someone who lost it because of their quirk. Well. Provided that guy wasn't dead. But Izuku... definitely wasn't going to mention that - mostly because a small part of him didn't want to think that he had just spent a good long while actually _enjoying_ the company of a murderer.

"Huh." Was her only response.

They spent the rest of that night together, Toga because she had nowhere to sleep anyway, and Izuku because he didn't really have anywhere important to be. Also, he didn't really _want_ to have to try and find his way home in the middle of the night. He was perfectly content in this McDonalds with the maybe-a-murderer he already knew. He had no wish to go make anymore new 'friends'. Toga became his third phone contact that night, which was simultaneously very said and quite pleasant. Her contact information went directly under Toru, who herself was directly under his Mother.

It was, much to Izuku's detriment, and completely without his knowledge, that he had managed to completely take for granted a single part of his analysis of the situation.

To Izuku, who had figured that everything with Toga - who's family name turned out to be Himiko - could start from square one now that they had gotten past the whole 'nearly killing him' thing, it never occurred to him to actually _bring up_ the topic of his supposed offer to date.

To one Himiko Toga, she had spent an entire night with a nice boy who didn't mind how weird she was, had asked her on a date, and even offered to let her have some of his blood now and then. She wouldn't call it 'love' just so, because she _knew_ what love felt like. She felt it every time she saw that drippy red substance she craved so much. But if forced to put a name to Izuku, she would almost definitely call him her _Boyfriend_.

-ooo-

**Your Journal Has Been Updated! **

**'Find More Information On the Extremely Creepy Girl' has changed, to 'Help Toga Get Her Life Back!'**

**Requirements: Make Sure Toga doesn't go to jail!  
Rewards: ?**

**Congratulations! You have successfully completed 'Find More Information On The Extremely Creepy Girl!' and been awarded 400 Experience! There is 300 more experience required to reach your next level!**

**You have currently engaged in a long rest! You will awaken in-**

Izuku blinked his eyes open, once more having slept exactly eight hours from the minute he got home that morning. He stared at his ceiling, almost _missing_ normal sleep. His quirk's method of resetting each night was efficient he had to admit, but it wasn't very _relaxing._ There was no slow drift into oblivion, no relaxed stretching in bed. The second his head hit the pillow he was out. Then he spent a moment checking his notifications, and then he was awake again.

"At least I healed..." he grumbled as he got out of bed, thankful for the single point of healing that had brought him back to full health if nothing else. It was annoying but he guessed that - _in theory _anyway - he could recover from near death in just under ten days provided he wasn't too banged up.

He spent a moment sitting up on his bed thinking.

On the one hand, the quest changing meant he had done _something_ right by helping Toga a bit. He had gotten experience for it and everything. But on the _other_ hand, the wording of it _strongly_ suggested she might end up in jail if he didn't do anything. But what could _he_ possibly do to stop someone from going to _jail?_

He continued to think on that well into the late afternoon, which he spent reviewing material he would need for his third and final trimester in middle school. He would definitely need to ace his classes if he wanted to score a spot in UA. He doubted he would be able to make it purely on the strength of his practical showing. He'd heard those were always _quite_ violent, and while he was confident he would grow in time, right now his actual ability to _hurt_ things was pretty minuscule.

He kind of wished his quirk could just be fire hands or something. That would be _way_ easier than The Gamer was to manage. As it was, being a Bard made his Quirk mostly seem like it made him good at lying to, and tricking people which... well that was kind of villainous sounding actually. Huh.

His depressing thoughts had just started to slide towards accepting defeat and applying to the support course by itself when a beep from his cellphone told him he had a new message from someone. His Mother was in the living room - and also couldn't really figure out _how_ to send text messages - which meant that it was either Toru or Toga calling on him.

Swiping the device off of his table, Izuku flipped it open to find a message from Toru.

"Hey, lets go train, I'm super bored. Heart, Smiley Face, Clapping Hands emoji." Izuku read aloud wryly.

"Sure... where... do... you... want... to... meet." Izuku mumbled as he typed. It was somewhat tedious since he had an old flip phone and had to type by pressing the numbers in the correct sequence, but it wasn't an insurmountable challenge, even if it _was_ an issue that hadn't existed when Izuku had completely lacked friends. Toru, who was apparently much, _much_, better at using her cellphone than Izuku was replied almost instantly to his own slowly type message. Izuku stared at the name she had given him in complete confusion. He felt like he should recognize it, but at the same time...

"Dagobah Beach?" Izuku said in confusion, staring at the ceiling of his room.

Thirty minutes later and at least one wrong turn later, Izuku found himself staring at what was possibly the most horrendous thing he had ever witnessed - which was saying alot considering he had nearly been kidnapped by sentient sewage a few weeks ago. He had - if he was being honest with himself - sort of expected to find well... a _beach_ here. Yes part of that had been the idle part of his teenage mind imagining Toru in a swimsuit, but really it was called Dagobah _Beach_. He didn't think he was shooting all _that_ high with his expectations. However, instead of the sea spreading out before him, the sand dunes below him were almost _completely _obscured by mountains and mountains of scrap. When he bothered to look more closely, he could even see _whole cars_ sticking out of some of the wreckage.

"Uh... Toru?!" Izuku called out, no sure how he was going to find the invisible girl in this mess.

"Hey-o~" Toru called from behind him, covering his eyes with her hands which, being invisible, didn't... actually do much.

"Um. Toru? What... I mean, what exactly are we doing here...?" Izuku asked curiously. He had mostly just packed his D&D books and some beach things. A Towel. Some swim trunks. He wasn't sure exactly how useful those things were going to be if there wasn't even a beach to visit.

"Training duh. You know using your Quirk in public is illegal right? Well no one can _see you_ if you're down there! There are lots of these clear spots I used to use as a secret base growing up!" Toru replied chipperly, skipping past him and finally giving him a full view of her. Izuku hadn't exactly been expecting her to show up already in a swimsuit or anything, but the baggy pants, steel toed boots and thick overalls she was wearing looked more like she was trying to pad herself against an attack dog than appropriate beach wear.

Which would make sense if she was expecting to get hit.

Because this was training.

And not a date.

Reddening the longer he contemplated that thought - not that he had thought of this as a date at all of course! - Izuku quickly moved to follow her, descending slowly into the metal maze at the bottom of the nearby stairwell.

"So I was wondering, maybe you're _not_ stuck as a Bard. Like, maybe if you wrote a different character sheet you'd absorb _that_ to. So I brought a bunch!" Toru said, calling to him from where she was leading him further and further across the scrapyard that was once a beach. That was... actually that was a really good idea. Why hadn't he thought of that? He supposed his life _had_ been very briefly in danger... again... that _could _be somewhat distracting.

"That's great Toru!" Izuku honestly praised. He was pretty sure that if he didn't have Toru to talk to then he would be _completely_ lost with regards to his quirk. Yeah he had read most of the rulebooks, but that didn't mean he had developed anything even vaguely approaching mastery of the game. Heck, he still found himself checking basic rules every now and then because he had forgotten them.

"Mhm!" Toru hummed before stopping dead in the center of a small clear portion of beach with a broken truck on one end and a damage couch on the other. The couch was missing one of its seats, and the rusty springs pushing up against the remaining two cushions looked significantly less than comfortable, but evidently neither of those things bothered Toru over much, because she unslung the suspiciously heavy looking duffel bag she had been carrying over one shoulder with alarming ease and dumped it onto the sand. Then she dropped down onto the couch like she owned the thing.

"Okay! First things first!" She said with zeal as Izuku dropped his own bag next to hers and - noting how close he would be to Toru if he also sat on the couch - chose to fall onto his haunches in the sand. He watched curiously as she dug around in her bag for a few seconds before withdrawing a character sheet that looked as if it had been bent and crumpled by whatever else the girl was carrying in the duffel. She coughed slightly in embarrassment as she drew it fully into view, smoothing out the character sheet and holding it out to Izuku.

"Okay so... you just grab it and it burns up right?" She said hopefully, shaking the crumpled papers at him until he stretched a hand out to take them.

"I mean, that's what happened the _first _time." He said, and jerked backwards in shock when the second his hand touched the page it began to crumble and burn up, vanishing in a puff of cinder and ash. For a second nothing happened. Izuku quirked his head to the side in thought, then opened his character sheet to see if there was any difference. There wasn't of course. Nothing had change whatsoever. He was just about to open his mouth to ask if Toru had another character sheet he could try when he heard the bubbly girl speak up herself.

"Izuku Midoriya has invited you to join his Party?" She said curiously, lifting one thickly clad arm up to poke at something hovering in the air directly in front of her. Izuku's eyes practically bugged out of his head as she spoke, and he whipped around to stare dumbfounded at her as her hand slapped loudly against the 'yes' button he was sure she could see and that he himself couldn't.

"Toru I don't know if-" He started, not sure if it was particularly safe to let his quirk completely wash over someone else. What if it made them _have_ to listen to his diplomacy rolls? He himself was basically entirely beholden to the rules of D&D, so wouldn't letting someone else join his party do the same to them?

"I'm a druid." Toru said blandly before her voice raised an octave and a pitch.

"I'm a druid! **I'm a druid! ****_I'm a druid, I'm a druid, I'm a druid!_**" She screeched, her voice becoming more and more ecstatic the more she repeated herself. Izuku had to resist the urge to shiver as she did so. Towards the end of that torrent of words Toru had almost started to sound like _Toga_ when she was talking about blood. Almost.

"So... you have a-" Izuku said, about to ask if she too had a bunch of hovering notification windows now permanently attached to her thoughts. Right up until his quirk decided his day hadn't been weird enough and decided to throw him a curve ball.

**The area you are in has become a Quick Dungeon!**

**Your party has entered: The Goblin Scraptropolis!**

"...huh?" Izuku asked in complete and utter confusion at what he was seeing. Confusion that was quickly supplanted by terror, when a three foot tall green creature who's total body mass was probably at least 50% sharp toothy maw ambled dumbly out of the nearest scrap heap. It was a hole that a normal human couldn't possibly have fit through, but to a creature this small would have functioned perfectly as a tunnel. Izuku and the creature stared at eachother for a solid moment before the creature slowly lifted it's right arm, within which was held a broken hunk of metal from somewhere that had clearly be sharpened to a dagger like pointedness.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!" The creature screamed as it began to run at him.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!" Izuku screamed as he startled back from the thing.

"...Aaaaah?" Toru said, roughly two seconds after she stepped forward to violently bludgeon the things head in with a wooden baseball bat from bag, over and over again, until it stopped moving.

Which was just a _tad_ too much for Izuku.

So, not for the first time, and probably not for the last time in his life; He fainted.

**-ooo-**

**Wow. I mean I was having trouble with this and then at the halfway point I just sort of got the engine revving. That might be because I got warmed up, or it might be because that was about the time I started drinking enough coffee to melt my stomach lining completely out of existence. **

**So, some things. Relative to the cannon, I admit I made a mistake. The time between when Izuku starts training and when he goes for the entrance exam at UA is indeed ten months. This is because Japan works on a trimester system - so they can finish two thirds of a school year and then still have another third plus summer break left over before high school starts in order for this time period to make sense. Thats the only way ****_I_**** can reason through it, because I can't fathom letting middle school kids just straight up not go to school for ten months to prepare for a test that ****_most _****of them will fail would fly in super strict japan. **

**Another thing is, after some browsing I decided to firmly place this Toga slightly closer to the beginning of her descent into bug fuck insanity, as in, not quite so off the deep end yet as to be iredeemable. This places her basically a few days after she completely messes up that guy she likes at school to drink his blood, but before she started mauling random people to do the same. I'm taking creative liberties with the overall laws in BnH because I've done some police academy and can't fathom a society like theirs ****_not_**** having some leeway for people just born unlucky. Like Gunheads head is literally a gun. Are you going to arrest him at 9 years old because ****_his head is a god damn gun?_**** I doubt it. **

**I sort of struggled with the idea of including the Gamers space warped dungeon shtick to this fic since it doesn't really line up with Izuku, but then I realized that he's not ****_really_**** getting the full D&D experience if I don't find some way to force him into an actual dungeon now and then. So now instead of cleaning up scrap you can all enjoy the next chapter of Izuku getting traumatized by the first job of any true murder hobo. Goblin cleanup. If it seems like Toru is mostly unphased here remember that for this version of her, this is basically living the dream. Plus, unlike Izuku, she's actually been training to beat people up for a living for a while now. This isn't that out of left field for her. **

**Anyway, that's all I got. Have a good one and as always,**

**Thanks for Reading.**


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